


Yogensha

by EldritchMage



Series: Logan and Rachel Osaka [1]
Category: Wolverine and the X-Men - All Media Types, X-Men - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-23
Updated: 2015-03-23
Packaged: 2018-03-19 08:11:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 24,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3602805
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EldritchMage/pseuds/EldritchMage
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Logan the samurai has always been my favorite part of the Wolverine universe, so here's a riff on that. It's Part 1 of a long saga.</p><p>When Rachel Osaka's wealthy parents were assassinated, Charle Xavier isn't sure they were the real target. Neither of them were mutants, but Rachel is. Charles invites her to hide at the Xavier Institute while they sort out Rachel's undeveloped talents and what might make them valuable -- or dangerous -- to someone. Logan's in residence, in between those jobs he can't talk about, teaching the kiddies martial arts, so Charles decides he's the perfect one to stand as Rachel's last line of defense if someone comes looking for her.</p><p>Logan doesn't want anything to do with one of Sotheby's junior antiques experts who happens to have weird talents. She doesn't want anything to do with those weird talents, either. But fate has a way of turning life in the most unexpected directions. It starts with a cup of tea, then a katana...</p><p>Please leave me a comment to let me know what you think. Thanks!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Yogensha

**Author's Note:**

> I've borrowed freely from the comics, movies, etc. There are so many versions of X-Men out there that I haven't held to all of the canon (and they're often inconsistent among themselves), but I've tried to keep the big stuff intact. So have fun as you read, and don't get too hung up on which element is from a movie, a comic, another comic, or something else.
> 
> As usual, the typical disclaimers apply -- all the X-Men are property of Marvel, Inc. Rachel Osaka/Omen is my character, and doesn't resemble anyone I know.

I wasn’t at the mansion when the new kid checked in, but I’m glad I missed it – lots of noise, too much angst, the stink of too many emotions. I’d hear about it soon enough, when Chuck briefed me on the changes around the place since I’d last dropped by. I’d been up north on my own journeys for a few months.

 _Welcome home, Logan,_ a voice insinuated in my head as I parked my Harley in the garage. I hate it when he does that. My head’s been too messed with enough over the years – decades –– for me to like having anyone but me in it. I especially don’t like sharing space with the world’s most powerful telepath. The only thing good about it was that Charles Xavier was principled enough to tell me that he was doing it, and he didn’t dig for whatever.

 _Hiya, Chuck,_ I thought as I walked into the long front hallway. I sniffed once, twice, confirming what I’d picked up outside _. You had some kinda party. I smell somebody new. Female. New student?_

I got a quick sense of Xavier’s chagrin at my nickname for him, which made me grin. _I expected your excellent senses would pick up the remnants of today’s events. I’d like to talk with you once you get yourself settled._

_Got any beer?_

Chuck winced again, but he knew I was teasing. _This is still a school, Logan. I believe you’ll find plenty of milk in the kitchen._

 _Just the thing,_ I thought sarcastically. _I’ll grab something and stop by._

_I’ll meet you in the library._

I dumped my duffel in the room Chuck was nice enough to loan me when I stopped by. Then I took a quick sniff around, both inside and outside my door, thought about what that told me, and headed down to the kitchen. It was early evening on a week night, close to eight, and quiet – I expected that most of the kids were still doing homework. The one or two I saw offered quiet hellos as they passed me in the halls. I’d put a fair number of them through their first self defense classes, which most of them tended to remember. A few more rummaged through the kitchen, making nachos and peanut butter sandwiches and pizza bagels.

“Hi, Logan!” my pal Jubilation Lee heralded enthusiastically when I strolled in, and launched herself at me. “I didn’t know you were back. Want a pizza bagel?”

“Hey, kid – oof! No thanks, Jube,” I said once Jubilee let me out of her hug. “What else is in the fridge?”

“Sandwich stuff, some leftover lasagna, maybe some chicken.”

“No more chicken,” a boy apologized sheepishly through a mouthful of bird. “Sorry, Mr. Logan.”

“S’okay,” I waved him back to his snack. “Lasagna’s good.”

I busied myself with a plate and the lasagna and was about to use the microwave when a gawky redheaded boy with orange eyes offered to take my plate. “Hey, Logan.”

“Hey, Jeremy.”

He held the plate briefly, then put it on the kitchen table. “It’s really –”

“Hot,” I winced. Like a dummy, I’d reached for the plate and gotten a handful of blisters for my trouble. “It’s… real hot, Jeremy.”

“Sorry, Logan,” Jeremy said shamefacedly.

“No problem, kid,” I reassured him, and held up my hand. The blisters were already disappearing. “Good to see you’ve been practicin’.”

He brightened. “Yessir. I haven’t lit anything up outright in two months.”

“Except your algebra book,” one of the girls razzed, and the conversation quickly degenerated into a lot of good-natured ribbing back and forth that only a group of mutants could appreciate. I grinned at the noise, found a kitchen towel, and gingerly picked up my plate, a fork, and a half-empty quart of milk.

“Hey, don’t kill each other,” I told them, and left them all laughing around the table. Sometimes life around Chuck’s mansion was so wholesome that it made my teeth ache. But it was good to hear the kids laugh. That wasn’t always so easy for mutants, just to share a laugh with friends.

I headed for the library with the lasagna in one hand and the milk in another, then realized that Jean was coming towards me.

“Welcome back, Logan,” she smiled. Oh, hell. Dr. Jean Grey was tall, talented, and a temptation to any red-blooded man, mutant or otherwise. Today, her smile was as enigmatic as it was beautiful, as alluring as the Mona Lisa, but I’d learned early on that what simmered underneath her luminous skin wasn’t for me. I held up my plate and my milk and nodded at the library door.

“Little help here, Red?”

Her grin spread wider as she folded her arms over her chest. Was that a come-hither look in her big, blue eyes, an invitation in the way she shook her mane of red hair over her shoulders, or was I just wishing? “You know the Professor hates it when you eat in the library, Logan.”

“Chuck’s too set in his ways, Red. Guy like me’s good to shake him up now and again. Might do wonders for you, too.”

“He hates it when you call him Chuck, too.”

“I live for those moments. Get the door. Please.”

The door swung open in response to Jean’s telekinesis.

“Thanks. See you later?”

She didn’t answer, but she did follow me into the library. It was the typical baronial library, all dark paneling and leather chairs and mahogany tables, windows two stories tall with heavy burgundy velvet draperies. Chuck sat behind the baronial desk, as usual impeccable in his hand-tailored suit.

“Good evening, Logan. Is that lasagna?”

“I thought you were psychic,” I pretended to be shocked as I plunked myself down in one of the cushy leather chairs in front of the desk. I put the milk carton on the floor beside the chair, got the towel comfortably arranged between my hand and the plate, and speared a mouthful of noodles and sauce. “Not bad, Chuck. I’d keep the cook this time.”

“Thank you for that advice, Logan.” Chuck’s indulgent smile told me that he wasn’t upset enough about my eating in the library to make me stop. “Good evening, Jean. How is our guest settling in?”

“She’s very quiet, Professor,” Jean replied. Her beautiful face wore a resigned frown. “That’s to be expected, under the circumstances, but…”

“Agreed.” Xavier folded his hands in his lap and leaned towards me. “Logan, I need your help. As you sensed, we have a guest. Her name is Rachel Osaka. She’s a dealer in British and French antiques. Her parents were assassinated two days ago – “

“She’s the daughter of Shiro and Kyoko Osaka, the computer magnates in Tokyo?” I asked.

Jean and Chuck exchanged a look. “I’m impressed, Logan.”

“Why? You think I don’t watch CNN now and again? Or frequent anyplace other than the Xavier Institute that has a TV?”

“Both,” Jean teased.

“Funny,” I mock scowled. “Heard about it the day it happened. Funeral was on all the cable channels yesterday. Didn’t know they had a daughter.”

“A most unusual daughter,” Chuck went on smoothly. “Rachel is a mutant, and she’s been brought here for her safety. I’m not convinced that her parents were the real targets of the assassins. They may have been eliminated in an attempt to get to Rachel.”

I arched an eyebrow at Chuck. “Why would someone be after the kid? Kidnappin’s out, because dead parents can’t pay the ransom.”

“True,” Chuck allowed. “Rachel’s talents may be the reason. Talents that she is trying to suppress.”

“What do you think I can do for her?”

Chuck leaned forward. “Rachel needs time to sort through what has happened, and I hope with our help she can learn to face her talents as a mutant. She’s twenty-three but looks younger, so I offered her the chance to hide here in plain sight with our students. I envision she will sit in on a few suitable classes to blend in, which will offer her a distraction, a chance to be with other mutants. That will give Jean and me time to work with her. I hope we can ease her fears about her talents. I’d like her to attend some of your classes, too, Logan. You will be staying with us for a while, I hope.”

“I ain’t the touchy-feely type –“

“Exactly what Rachel needs right now, Logan. Besides, she isn’t a tyro. I understand she’s quite well versed in several martial arts. You understand the discipline that underlies those arts, and you embody that discipline when you want to. It might give you something to work with, to offer her something familiar, and your own expertise to challenge her. Can I count on you to help?”

I concentrated on my lasagna for a few moments. I took a long gulp of milk from the carton, ignoring both my friends’ pained looks. Then I put the carton and the plate down, and for the first time tonight looked seriously at them both.

“Given that the kid’s in the room next to mine, I’d say you want me to do more than drill her in tae kwon do. You expect someone to come after her, either to kill her or to take her for her talents, and you want me to stop anybody who does.”

Jean and Chuck exchanged looks again, but these looks were as serious as mine.

“We would be well able to deal with those who would wish her harm, were you not here,” Chuck agreed. “But now that you are, you are by far the best equipped to stand as her last line of defense should anything get past the rest of us. I hope you will stay long enough for this to be sorted out.”

“Fair enough,” I said. “What’s this talent of hers?”

“I’m not sure, nor is she,” Chuck admitted. “What I have discerned points to something about time.”

“Time?” I questioned. “What about time?”

“That is what I shall endeavor to discover over the next few days,” Chuck said briskly. “That’s why I asked Jean to join us. She met Rachel with me this afternoon, and helped her settle in the room next to yours. I’d gotten a hint of your imminent arrival at that point, so I thought it was reasonable to put her there before we talked to you. Jean, what can you tell us about how that went?”

Jean had been content to perch on the arm of the chair next to me, but now she sighed and settled into the chair proper. “Physically, she’s healthy and suffered no injury from the attack that killed her parents. She was with them when they were gunned down, Logan. Mentally… without prying, I couldn’t find out much. But it’s clear that she’s keeping herself under very tight control. Every move is studied, careful, calculated – as if even the smallest spark of spontaneity would be disastrous. She feels so alone. She was very close to both of her parents.”

That matched the scents I’d noted outside my door – rank with turmoil and misery – but I kept that to myself. “Tough break. All right, I’ll take a look at the kid and let you know if I’ll stay in town.”

“Logan?” Jean asked, and without thinking of the danger, I met her eyes. The question in them was clear, and the woman doing the asking knew how I felt. I looked back at Chuck, but not soon enough.

“That’s cheatin’, Chuck.”

He smiled. “So you’ll stay?”

“What the hell,” I exhaled ruefully, and shot Jean a crooked grin. “I’ll look after your new kid for a week or two.”

“Thank you.”

Jean smiled, knowing she’d been sneaky, but she was such a goody-goody that she’d done it only out of sympathy for a girl who was in trouble. I thought real hard about how I’d like to get a certain redhead in trouble with her boyfriend, and winked at her.

“I deserved that,” Jean said as her complexion tinged with pink, and got up out of her chair.

“In spades. You owe me, Red.”

“I’ll take this back to the kitchen for you,” Jean said. She collected my empty plate and the drained milk carton and let herself out of the library.

I snorted under my breath and turned back to Chuck. “Have you already told Rachel Osaka about her new shadow?”

Chuck shook his head. “She was still in shock when she got here. I thought it best to let her sleep first, then start fresh tomorrow.”

“Did she drive herself here, or did somebody bring her?”

“Her family’s people brought her here. Why do you ask?”

“Then somebody knows where she is.”

“I did a little of my own magic, Logan. The two retainers who brought her here won’t remember anything about this little sojourn to the Xavier Institute. They’ll remember a trip to a Broadway show and an excellent dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant.”

I nodded approval. “Who knows who she really is, other than you and Jean?”

“Ororo’s here. Scott is away with a group of the students on a camping trip. Bobby and Anna Marie are on the trip with Scott.”

I laughed. “Rogue ought to love that. She’s been leery of campin’ ever since that cross country trek of hers. So you, Jean, ‘Ro, and I are the only ones who know Rachel’s real story.”

“That’s right. When would you like to meet Rachel tomorrow? In one of your regular classes?”

I thought about the smells I had picked up earlier. “I don’t think so.”

“What do you suggest?”

I thought about it some more. “I’ll know it when I see it, Chuck. And I’ll go as easy as I know how.”

Chuck looked askance at me. “Do you know how?”

I grinned and pulled out a cigar. “Now and again I do, Chuck. And I’ll smoke this outside.”

“I appreciate that, Logan. And your agreement to help Rachel Osaka, as well.”

I waved a hand and let myself out of the library. I was still hungry, so I headed back to the kitchen to see what the kids had left. Surprisingly, they’d cleaned up most of the carnage, leaving only a box of doughnuts and another carton of milk on the counter. I put the milk back in the fridge, helped myself to a chocolate number, and strolled out, munching as I went. I finished the last bite as I got to my room. Just for grins, I paused outside Rachel’s door.

She was crying so quietly that only the breeze and I heard her, and her scent was as desolate as it’d been earlier. I passed on to my own door and let myself into the darkness. I opened the big window and sat on the sill to smoke my cigar, looking out into the night. Every room in the mansion had a beautiful view, and this one was no exception, especially with the stars gleaming so brightly overhead in a moonless, cloudless sky. The pristine lawn stretched out like fur over sleeping muscles. The mansion windows were lit here and there with yellow light, and all looked calm and secure.

I finished my cigar. I’d bet dollars to doughnuts that this serenity wouldn’t last long.

 

* * *

 

I slept lightly but well all night. I’d kept one ear open to pick up any sounds from the room next door. That meant I hadn’t hit REM sleep too much, which for me is a good thing. Sometimes things I don’t remember drift loose in REM sleep, and sometimes that means the room gets trashed until I wake up. Fortunately, nothing like that came to mind, so Chuck’s pretty furniture survived intact. I lay in bed drowsing for a while, enjoying the comfortable bed and the lack of anything else to do.

Rachel had eventually stopped crying and fallen asleep. I sniffed. Her scent was calmer, strong enough to tell me that she was still in her room. I got up, showered, put on a clean tee shirt and jeans, and sat down to meditate. Nothing too deep this morning, because I still had an ear out for sounds from next door.

Eventually I heard what I was waiting for – the shower running, the rustle of someone dressing. I put on my boots and timed the opening of my door to coincide with Rachel opening hers.

She nearly jumped out of her skin.

“Hey, kid, I’m sorry,” I said, cranking back my pheromones. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

She met my eyes. She had to look up to do it, which says something. I’m not the tallest guy in the room, but she was a good three centimeters shorter. Just over one and a half meters tall, 45 kilos, with black hair like heavy silk that fell just past her chin, and pale eyes the color of jade and the shape of almonds. Very slender, not a lot of curves, but what was there was nice. Odd thing – it was late spring, just starting to be tee shirts and shorts weather, but she was dressed in a long-sleeve pullover and pants, shoes and socks, and thin gloves, all of them black. Not a lick of makeup on her pale face, not that such flawless skin needed it. No jewelry. She was striking more than beautiful, maybe because there was so little warmth in her eyes. At first, I thought they were cold. Then I picked up the scent of her fear. Maybe all the black was mourning rather than attitude, for all that it suited her. The fear dribbled away as she recovered from my unexpected appearance.

“I didn’t realize anyone was still up here,” she said softly. “I heard the students a while ago, I thought everyone would be away…”

“I’m on the road a lot,” I shrugged. “When I’m here, I handle martial arts classes for the Professor. I got in late last night, so I slept in today. My name’s Logan.”

“Rachel,” she offered tentatively. Jean had been right – the kid held herself as if breathing would bring the world crashing down, and hugged her arms to her chest as if she didn’t want to touch anything. In deference to that, I kept my distance. “I’m sorry I jumped so badly.”

“It’s okay,” I tried to reassure her. “C’mon. Lemme show you where the kitchen is. You look like you need a cup of tea in the mornin’.”

She hesitated, her eyes darting to both sides as if figuring where to run, but then her lips tightened. She looked directly at me, her self-possession growing. She had a solid core of something in her spine.

“Yes, thank you. I would like tea.”

I led her down the hall, staying a good arm’s span away. Once we reached the kitchen, I had her look through the cupboards for tea while I filled the kettle and put it on to boil. That led to mugs and spoons, and then to eggs and toast. Rachel loosened up when she found some blackberry jam in the fridge, even smiled.

I enjoyed my fried eggs and toast and didn’t ask any questions while we ate. Rachel got brave enough to ask me about what martial arts I knew, and I eased her into a conversation about a safe, comfortable topic. I didn’t know how adept she was, but she moved as if she’d learned a fair amount, and she was knowledgeable about the subject.

After breakfast, I offered to show her around the school. After some hesitation, she agreed, so I took her on the same tour Chuck had given me on my first visit. I kept to the public areas – none of the X-Men stuff – a couple of the kids’ classes, the stables, the gym complex. Several kids greeted me by name, which reassured Rachel that I was legit. She seemed to enjoy the semblance of normalcy, and when some of the kids showed off their talents, she looked thoughtful. For the most part, though, Rachel pulled herself in, unwilling to touch anything she didn’t have to. When she did brush her fingers against something, her eyes took on a brighter cast as if the sun touched them, and she winced. Not enough for the casual person to notice, but I did. She reminded me of Rogue, whose talent was both curse and blessing – she drained the life force of every living thing she touched, even taking on the personality and mutant talents of those she touched. Rogue had once told me what that felt like, as if someone else lived inside her, trying to shove her aside. It was no wonder she wore gloves to protect herself against that kind of invasion. I hoped a similar talent wasn’t Rachel’s curse, too.

We headed back to the kitchen where Rachel finally asked a question.

“So… is everyone here is a… mutant?”

A lot of courage went into that question, which I respected. “Yup,” I nodded casually, putting the kettle on for more tea. “The students, the teachers, Professor Xavier –”

“So you’re a mutant, too, then.”

“Yup,” I said, knowing what was coming.

“What… talent…”

“My body heals itself,” I said matter-of-factly. “I don’t age much, I don’t get sick, and I don’t stay hurt for long. Makes me a good choice to teach martial arts. Doesn’t matter if someone messes up in class.”

Rachel didn’t know what to make of that, so I took a paring knife from a drawer and held it up. Sure, I could’ve popped a claw, but Rachel wasn’t ready for that. I cut a two centimeter-long line across my forearm deep enough to bleed impressively. I put the knife in the sink, then sat down next to Rachel and let her watch it heal before her eyes. Her eyes widened and her mouth shaped a soundless o, which were the most natural reactions I’d seen from her. She reached out to touch my arm, which now had no trace of the gash, not even a scar, but I slid my arm out of the way.

“Uh-uh,” I said quickly. “Sorry, kid. I’ve seen you wince when you touch things, even with those gloves on. I’ve been a soldier for a lot of years, and some of it wasn’t pretty. I don’t know what your talent is, but I don’t want anythin’ from me to make you jumpier than you are now.”

Rachel drew back her fingers as if I’d stung her, and her face froze. “I thought that I’d controlled my reactions –”

“You do that real well, Rachel. Well enough that most people wouldn’t notice.” I got up, took the kettle off the heat, and brought two mugs of tea to the table. I slid one to Rachel. “But healin’ myself ain’t all I can do. My senses are more like an animal’s than a human’s. I can smell when you’re frightened. See how your eyes light when you touch somethin’. Hear when you’re cryin’ too quietly for anyone else to hear.”

My nostrils filled with the scent of shame and more misery than she should bear for something she had no control over.

How do you comfort someone without touching her? The kid had just lost both of her parents, had an uncontrollable, scary talent she didn’t want, and was alone in a strange place. Could it get any worse?

_I’ll be right there, Logan._

It had just gotten worse. I thought as hard as I could. _Back off, Chuck. Let her get to her feet without you meddlin’ in her head._

A brief moment of silence preceded a very neutral reply. _All right, Logan._

Mercifully, Chuck got out of my head. I was grateful that Rachel hadn’t picked up on my irritation and thought it was directed at her. She still stared at her gloved hands clutching each other on the table.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Logan. I didn’t know I’d disturb you.”

“Just Logan. And you didn’t disturb me. You’re in a safe place where you can sort things out. Hell, most of the kids and half the teachers are workin’ through somethin’ on any given day, so you ain’t alone. You don’t owe me or anyone else an explanation, and you don’t have to tell anyone anythin’ until you’re ready. But just so you know, the Professor told me why you’re here. I’m sorry about your parents.”

If I’d thought Rachel had held herself tightly before, that was nothing like what she did now. Her body froze, her face went white, and she stopped breathing.

I found a couple of oven mitts and put them on. Then I took her by the shoulders and shook her gently.

“Keep breathin’, kid. Oxygen’s one of the four essential food groups, y’know.”

That got though to her, and she stared wide-eyed at me for a heartbeat. Then she laughed, almost crying but not quite. I let her shoulders go and banked my pheromones again to crank out nothing but calm.

Rachel pointed at the oven mitts. “Someone used those an hour ago to make a pizza bagel.”

I pricked up my ears. “Probably Jubilee. Pizza bagels are the staple of her life right now.”

“How can you be so casual about it?” Rachel’s voice was low, but the desperation in it was mirrored by the smell of fear. “It freaks me out every time. I don’t touch ‘things’. I touch little pieces of people’s lives, like some kind of weird intruder, a Peeping Tom. What someone cooked a few minutes ago. Who put the oats out for the horses. Whether that person was angry or happy when they fed the horses. Sometimes it’s horrible things. I don’t want to know these things! I don’t want to feel them!”

“Do the gloves help?”

Again she was surprised enough to laugh, but she sounded resigned. “No. They’re just an illusion to help me think I don’t have this.”

I took off the oven mitts, kept one in my hands, and fiddled with it. “We all try to play that game, that we don’t have some kind of disease, that we don’t have to mess with these things we can do. But maybe you know from the meditations that are part of the warrior’s code that we won’t ever be fully human as long as we run from a piece of ourselves.”

“That’s easy for you to say. You don’t have little bits of people’s lives crammed down your throat.”

“That’s true. I don’t. I’ve got the opposite problem.”

She looked up, startled. “What do you mean?”

Talking about something this personal was never easy, but I met her eyes and forced my muscles to uncoil. “I told you I was a soldier. My handlers figured that my healin’ abilities made it okay to bond adamantium onto my bones because I might actually survive the process. While they were at it, they went inside my head and took out what they didn’t want and put in what they did. All I’ve got for memories are shreds. I don’t know where I came from, who I am, how old I am – I don’t even know my real name. I don’t know whether I really did all the rotten stuff I remember, or if some sick black ops shrink gave me false memories. That’s hard to live with, and some days I do a lousy job of it. But I do a hell of a lot better job now than when I tried to run from it.”

Rachel searched my eyes with horrified fascination, then dropped her gaze. “That sounds like something awful out of a horror movie. It sounds like slavery.”

“Felt like it, too. What I remember. I work real hard at givin’ myself other things to think about.”

She made some small sound of understanding. “Have you known Professor Xavier long?”

I nodded. “A while. He’s a decent guy, and he can help you understand your talents.” _Okay, Chuck, there’s your intro._ “He’ll respect your wishes about what you want to do with your talents, too.”

_Thank you, Logan. I’ll be there momentarily. And well done._

_Don’t act so surprised,_ I ribbed the egghead as I finished my tea.

“Thank you,” Rachel was saying. “This has all been such a shock. I didn’t know what to do, or where to go. I wasn’t sure that I could trust anyone.”

“Know the feelin’,” I said with more irony than I hoped Rachel understood. “Take time to figure yourself out, Rachel. This is a good place to do that. And when you want a workout, look me up.”

“Okay,” Rachel agreed with the barest suggestion of a smile as Chuck and ‘Ro came in.

“Good morning, Logan,” Chuck greeted me cheerily, and I nodded back.

‘Ro had a big grin on her face. “Logan! I didn’t know you were back.”

It’s always a pleasure when an exotic woman as beautiful as Ororo Monroe gives me a hug, so I enjoyed it to the hilt. “Hiya, darlin’. How’ve you been?”

“Fine, fine. How about lunch? Around noon?”

“You’re on. I’ll see you later, ‘Ro, Chuck. Rachel, hang in there.”

I strolled out of the kitchen, thinking. I don’t remember any family, but I’ve lost close friends, especially during my black ops work, and no drink or drug or berserker’s rage dulled the loss – only the passage of time did. Losing parents had to hurt more than losing a friend, so I wished Rachel more success than I’d found when trying to make peace with such emptiness. I hoped she’d take me up on the martial arts. At least that would grant her physical catharsis, if not mental.

I exhaled. Chuck dipped into my thoughts long enough to tell me I had a class to hold, so I headed for the gym. It was time to earn my keep.

 

* * *

 

It’d been a while since I’d been back at the institute long enough to teach, so it was good to get back into it. I ran a couple of classes, one for beginners, and another for kids farther along. Most of the advanced students were away on the camping trip, so I didn’t have to extend myself, and I didn’t have any marks to heal when the pandemonium was done. ‘Ro and I had a long talk over burgers after the kids were done eating, catching up on what we’d done since my last visit. We even shot a couple games of pool in Chuck’s palatial game room, and as usual, I lost. I’m a pretty good pool player, but even though ‘Ro has a subtle touch with her weather powers, I know when she uses a whiff of breeze to get her shots to drop. But we didn’t spend long at that, as she had a history class to teach that afternoon. So when she packed up her wind gusts and blew out of the game room, I figured it was time to prep in case Rachel took me up on my offer.

I didn’t need the mayhem I’d find in the Danger Room, so I ducked into my room for my katana. Then I staked out the fencing room and limbered up.

Over the years, I’ve made my own ritual of moves that I go through with my katana. I can use it as a focus to either calm or arouse. Today, I wanted calm. I wanted control. I’d run pretty loose for the past couple of months, enjoying the occasional bar brawl or the long, surreal stream of consciousness that comes from riding a motorcycle for hours on a straight, empty road. Those are indulgences, easy to crave. I’ve spent too much of my life craving and indulging those things, sometimes just for the sheer howl of it, sometimes to lick my wounds, and sometimes to kick the demons that drove me.

I didn’t want that now. Sometimes – not often enough – I use the ritual steps to refine, to slice through the bullshit in my life. It’s not about flashy moves or showing off. It’s just me and the katana, me and gravity, my mind and my body, trying to find the center. I doubt if I’ll ever find peace in this world, but the closest I’ve come is when I completed the ritual in this way.

I ran through my ritual once for myself, because I didn’t expect Rachel to take me up on my offer.

I ran through it again because I wanted Rachel to take me up on my offer. Despite what Chuck thinks, I don’t always let rage do my thinking. If Rachel asked me for help, I’d have to be the calm, the focus, the teacher. It was no sure thing that I could honor that request. All I controlled was myself, and that was often problematic. But I’d try to be the samurai I was trained to be, with all the honor that entailed.

I ran through it a third time to settle, clear the noise, strip away the wants and desires – just be with the ritual. When I let the katana drop, relaxed, let down, I turned and Rachel was by the door.

I arched an eyebrow. “It takes work to sneak up on me without my knowin’.”

She looked down at her feet, then back at me. “You were deep in it. I didn’t want to interrupt. I’ve never seen anyone do it like that.”

“Like what?”

She looked away, searching. “I don’t know… so inward.”

Then I’d done what I’d set myself to do. “So what can I do for you?”

She pointed to my katana. “Do you have another one of those?”

“Might still be a rack of practice blades, if Chuck hasn’t moved them.”

“Chuck?” she asked, trailing behind me as I headed for the equipment room.

I snickered. “My nickname for Professor Xavier. I ain’t the most reverent man who’s ever walked through the doors.”

“Chuck… it doesn’t seem to fit him very well.”

“That’s why I like it. Here. Take your pick. Third one on the left has the best balance of the lot.”

She took off her gloves to take the blade, gingerly at first, maybe to let the impressions from the blade dull, then with more firmness. She went back out to the room to warm up. She was still dressed in black, but in things fit for the gym – quality, expensive things, professional gear rather than cheap flash. I let her warm up, watching quietly from the side as she turned and stepped. While her moves were correct, crisp, and controlled, they weren’t the moves of a fighter, but of a dancer beautifully representing the ritual. I wondered if she’d ever sparred in a real match.

“Try it again,” I suggested when she finished and looked a question at me. “You make the moves correctly, but you think about them too much. Feel them rather than study them. Make sense?”

“Not exactly,” she admitted.

“Okay, check the difference between this,” I did the sequence as precisely, as noncommittally as she had, “and this.” I did the sequence the way I do it, with every part of my body and brain committed. “See?”

“Your way is more… intense?” she guessed.

“One way is practice. The other way is livin’.”

“Okay,” she ventured, and set herself to start again. This time, she was more intense, but she still practiced rather than lived. When she looked at me again, I pulled at my lip.

“Depends on what you want to do with the moves,” I said.

“I want to do them the way they’re supposed to be done.”

“Gotta define that more. You make the moves into a dance, a thing of beauty to watch. That’s one perspective. You can be happy doing that for as long as you want.”

“But you don’t dance,” she guessed.

“Nope. I’m a soldier. I’ve fought usin’ these moves. Not a dance. Life. Just another perspective.”

She looked so lost that I shook my head, beckoned with my katana. “Doesn’t matter, kid. Just do. That’s enough for now.”

She went back to her wooden way of moving, and I let her. Rachel was numb inside, and just to get her to move was something. More would come. If whoever killed her parents gave her time.

 

* * *

 

The next couple of days were run-of-the-mill on one level – I taught classes, ate, spent time with ‘Ro in the Danger Room hacking through sims, slept more or less well.

On another level, I watched a mystery unfold. As I listened and watched, I got a clearer picture of the woman I was to protect. Rachel had had parents who’d loved her but hadn’t spoiled her, and while she’d gone to the best schools, she’d worked hard to stay in them and do well. She was well traveled, given that her parents’ company had offices in New York City, San Francisco, and Tokyo, and she spoke fluent Japanese, French, and English. The unexpected thing was her avid interest in British antiques – interesting for a child of Japanese parents. At least she could indulge that in the mansion, because Chuck had piles of that stuff. In some ways, she was more Anglophile than anything else – she read classic British literature, rode horses English style, and loved offbeat British sitcoms.

Then there was the level that raised my hackles. Her parents’ murders had so devastated Rachel that she barely went through the motions of life, all but dead to the danger heading for her. That bugged me. As bad as some of my life has been, I’ve never been that numb to my own safety, and her lack of awareness made mine hypersensitive. Despite that, I stayed patient, doggedly coaxing her through one dance routine after another, doing my best not to shake her by the scruff of the neck. Where I used martial arts to calm or arouse, she used them as a weird offering to the gods to keep her life in control. Maybe she thought that if she did the steps exactly so, then everything would be all right.

Guess you know what I thought about that.

Trouble was, she couldn’t handle any of the things I do to shake Chuck’s kids awake. Too fragile. But eventually, someone would figure out where she was and come after her, regardless of her state of mind. Leaving her unprepared didn’t sit well, so it was time to push.

I’d finally gotten her to spar a little, easy stuff. But she didn’t whale at me with any force, just moved with her usual obsession to do the thrust or parry exactly right. So today I slapped away her parries harder, cut in earlier or later than the dance routine dictated – in other words, I tried to make her mad.

I’ll give her this – she stuck with me, trying to force the game back to what she was comfortable with, but I was done playing by those rules. I pushed and poked and prodded.

“Come on, Rachel!” I barked. “Hit me! Get out of the dance routine and fight!”

“I don’t want to hurt you, Logan –”

“You can’t!” I snapped. “So hit me – or try to, because I’m going to hit you!”

I laid it on, and if Rachel missed that I wasn’t trying too hard, that was okay. She defended, giving ground, and I came on, hacking harder, harder, harder, even slapping her thigh hard enough to sting –

When she finally got mad, it was a thing to behold. She screamed in fury and came after me like a true berserker. She fought a lot more lethally than she danced, and I let her slash and slice and thrust for a good ten minutes. Finally, she was alive. I eventually had to parry her thrust so hard that it shocked her up to her elbows. Didn’t stop her. She threw away her blade and launched herself at me, screaming like a banshee.

I dropped my katana and let her come. She smacked me good a few times, but I stuck to defense, trying not to let her keep her hands on me for too long. Eventually she stumbled to her hands and knees, panting. I sat back on my heels just out of reach.

“About damn’ time, kid,” I exhaled, and waited to see what she’d do.

She didn’t look up. Her head hung down between her arms, her hair nearly touching the floor. She balled her hands into fists and pounded the floor with a violence that shocked her more than it did me. Then she howled – a long, furious noise full of everything that she’d suppressed for so long.

“Good,” I nodded. “Do it again.”

“What?” She looked up with her jade eyes nearly black with emotion.

“Do it again,” I said, my voice harsh. “You’ve needed this for a long time. Do it!”

She did, until she was out of breath and her hands hurt too much to keep pounding the floor. I let her. How many times had I vented that way? Torn up a bar because I couldn’t remember my name? Laughed because the latest X-Men crisis was the perfect cover for my rage? Fought my metabolism to get so drunk that what I didn’t remember didn’t matter? Watching her, I wanted to howl, too, let out the beast. But I kept the leash on.

As I expected, after the howling stopped, the crying jag started. I sat nearby, not offering false comfort, just a presence. I got up long enough to get a wet towel, then came back to sit while she cried. Eventually, Rachel exhausted herself. Exhaustion doesn’t change anything, but it is one way to find a piece of calm, and that’s what she needed. When she got to the point that she lay on her back, limp and staring up at the ceiling, I leaned over and offered her the wet towel. She took it without looking at me, wiped her face and neck with it, exhaled like she’d run a marathon, and let it drop to the floor.

“Good,” I said.

Rachel’s eyes zeroed in on mine. “Good?” she said incredulously. “You call this good?”

“Yup,” I replied mildly. “Because you fought back. That’s what I want you to do. Fight back.”

When Rachel jerked to a sitting position, all set to spit at me, I held up my hands. “Listen, kid. Somebody’s knocked you down pretty hard, and you’re havin’ a hard time gettin’ up. So far, all you’ve done is try to make nice with it. But whoever killed your parents ain’t nice, and when they come after you they ain’t gonna be nice. You’re gonna have to fight back.

“Now, I don’t know what you’ve been doin’ with Chuck and Red, but you’re no dummy. I bet you’re gonna want to live through whatever comes. So the sooner I can get you to fight with everything you’ve got, the better your odds are to survive. Make sense?”

Rachel stared at me, not knowing whether to curse me, thank me, or storm out. I sat on my pheromones again because I wanted her to decide for herself.

When she finally worked out what to do, it wasn’t what I expected. She slid over to me, her hand reaching for my arm.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, kid.” I slid out of her reach. “I told you –”

“I know exactly what you told me,” she said through gritted teeth, her eyes blazing brightly. “And I want to know what you didn’t tell me, too. Because whoever comes after me will be just as hard as you are, and I want to know what I’m up against, and what I have on my side.”

She lunged for my arm, and clamped both hands on my wrist. She didn’t begin to have enough strength to hold me if I’d wanted to get loose, but the determination on her face was so different from her usual frozen mask that I let her hands stay. Maybe I was curious about what she’d sense and how she’d handle it. Maybe I wanted something else.

Not to my surprise, in just a few seconds she dropped my arm like I’d burned her.

“Told you,” I shook my head.

She clamped onto my wrist again, twisted it around, and pushed on enough pressure points that I couldn’t free myself until she decided to let go.

“Yes, you did,” Rachel snarled. “But words don’t tell me as well as this does. Professor Xavier didn’t tell me as well with his reason and his careful logic and his consideration. So – just –”

She held on for a good ten seconds, more than I figured she would. I tensed when Rachel shuddered and her face contorted, probably in disgust because of whatever she picked up from me. She leaned into the floor, looking beaten, but just when I was going to speak she looked up again. Her body might be spent, but her eyes were finally alive. Her scent slowly changed, too, from rage to something more considering.

“Thank you.”

“For what?”

“You don’t know?”

I shook my head. “Rachel, I’m missin’ so many pieces of myself that if you sensed somethin’, I’d like to know just to get some of me back.”

She nodded. “Yesterday you said that you trained as a samurai, long ago. I feel it. Despite everything, you hold on to that. You value the truth. You’ve been honest with me, a lot more forthcoming about yourself than I suspect you usually are, and very patient. I understand you didn’t do this because you teach martial arts, but because you honor what you’ve been taught. You’ve agreed to put yourself between me and whatever will come after me, just as a samurai would. I appreciate what a gift you’ve offered.”

How do you answer that? I exhaled. “Doo itashimashite.” _You’re welcome._

She looked thoughtful. “I’ve never willingly tried to sense something from a person before. That’s why I flinched. What I sense from an object is more static. This was more… fluid, more complicated.”

“Okay,” I said slowly, digesting that. “So… tomorrow, you gonna fight or dance?”

She nodded. “Tomorrow, no more dancing.”

“Good. I’d like you to do something else, too. Tell me who you think might’ve killed your parents. It’ll be tough, but the more you give me to work with, the better I stay between you and trouble. Deal?”

Rachel met my eyes squarely, as an equal, for the first time. She was still scared, but the determination in her core was growing stronger every day. She nodded.

“Deal.”

“Good.” I got to my feet and offered her a hand up. She took it without hesitation. “Hang tough, okay?”

She nodded soberly, then surprised me with a bow that embodied all the fluid grace of her parents’ culture. “Kansha shimasu, Logan-kyoshi.”

She granted me honor not only with the title, but also with her bow. I met it humbly with as formal a bow.

“Doo itashimashite, Osaka-san.”

I picked up my katana and headed out of the gym, leaving Rachel to put away her blade and make her way out. I exhaled. I’d better eat a hearty dinner tonight, because that new determination in Rachel’s eyes told me that I’d need it tomorrow.

 

* * *

 

It was a good thing that I ate that big dinner last night, because less than twelve hours later I met Rachel in the gym for what turned out to be a long, long fight. Maybe pushing her yesterday hadn’t been the smartest thing I’d ever done, because today she went after me like I’d been the one who’d killed her parents. She wasn’t a bad fighter – not great, but far from the worst I’d seen – so I had to pay more than casual attention. There was enough catharsis, reckless abandon, and sheer fury behind her blows that she was going to beg for a session in the whirlpool down in the training room.

She kept me at it for so long that she missed her session with Chuck. Two hours into it, I spotted Jean standing in the doorway, watching.

_Hi, Logan._

_Hiya, Red. Kinda busy right now._

_So I see. Rachel was due to talk to the professor half an hour ago. When will you be done with her?_

I ducked a blow from Rachel’s whirling katana. _It’s – more when she’s done with me, Red. She’s_ – “Ow!” – _kinda into it right now._

Rachel had snuck in a slice across my forearm while I was distracted with Jean’s question – nothing serious, but it stung. I thwacked her back, but with the flat of my blade in deference to her lack of a healing factor. I circled around and lunged again while she was off balance, very much a street fighter’s cheat rather than an honorable samurai’s move. Rachel spat a curse –

_That much is obvious. What did you do to deserve such a fight?_

Jean didn’t think anything overt, but something in her mental touch made me roll my eyes – or I would have if a katana hadn’t been winging towards my ears. _I pushed, Red. She needed it –_ I parried Rachel’s blow and countered – _a week ago._

Rachel gave ground but came back in a blur of blows. I concentrated to keep steel from her flesh –

 _Should I give it another fifteen minutes?_ Jean inquired.

Rachel’s blade dove under mine and sliced deeply across my ribs like lightning. That did it. I glared at Jean and parried Rachel’s katana hard enough to fling it out of her hand and across the room away from Jean.

“Now,” I growled at Jean, ignoring my sliced and bloodied tee shirt, because the wound underneath the shreds was nearly closed. “If you wanna talk now instead of thinkin’ at me, Red, knock yourself out.” I glanced at Rachel. “She picks a hell of a way to tell me you’re late to see the Professor.”

Rachel looked surprised. “Oh – already?”

“You’ve been whalin’ at me for a couple of hours, kid,” I glanced at my shirt, then at her. “Guess you like this better than dancin’, eh?”

She looked at the red and gulped. “I am so sorry, Logan –”

“Already healed, kid. I told you; you can’t hurt me. So get outa here.”

Rachel caught my wink that Jean couldn’t see, and got that I was grousing for Jean’s benefit. “Oh. Right. I’ll… be back tomorrow.”

“Whatever knocks you out, kid. See ya.”

Rachel hurriedly collected her katana to clean and store it, and disappeared into the locker room.

I wiped my sweaty forehead with a clean part of my sliced tee shirt, and looked back at Jean. “Anythin’ else you wanna say, Red?”

She cocked her head at me and smiled. “You do a nice job with her, Logan. The professor thinks so, too. She made real strides yesterday. Thanks.”

I wiped my katana with a clean rag. “Don’t let it get around. It’d ruin my sterlin’ reputation.”

Jean laughed. “No, it wouldn’t.”

“No?” I looked slyly at her, and let my pheromones go as hard as they wanted. “Maybe I need to work on that. I’ve still got part of my shirt on, but if you wanna –”

“No,” she came back fast enough, but she was laughing.

“Your loss,” I shrugged, grinning while I cranked the pheromones back again. “Since I can’t do that little favor for you, maybe you can do one for me. For Rachel, actually.”

“What’s that?” Jean asked, sobering when she understood I was serious.

“Back me when I tell Chuck that I want to take Rachel down to the Danger Room. I want to run some sims for her. You know what kind.”

“Do you think that’s necessary, Logan?”

“Come on, Jean. You’re a mind reader, and you know as well as I do what might go down when the guys who whacked Rachel’s parents figure out where she is. I can make her wicked fast with a katana after a few sessions like this, but I can’t set up contingencies as fast as the sims can.”

With a shrug, Jean conceded that I was right. “All right, Logan. You’re right to prepare for it. Talk to the Professor, and if you need help persuading him, Ororo and I will chime in.”

“Thanks.” I exhaled. “Make sure you leave Rachel time for a long soak tonight. She’s gonna hurt.”

Jean grinned. “What about you?”

“Don’t tempt me, darlin’. I love this stuff. The only kind of exertion better than this takes two.”

“It’s still no, Logan,” Jean waved, and headed back to the main part of the mansion.

I sighed in regret. Even though I never expected Jean to take me up on my teasing, and she never expected me to act on my teasing, I’d enjoyed some interesting imaginings during the time I’d known her. I didn’t indulge in any now, but got ready for the pre-lunch jujitsu jamboree with the younger kids. I had to growl six or seven times a minute to keep that lot of noise in line, but they were generally pretty easy duty. I’d get with ‘Ro later to set up sims for Rachel that were anything but.

 

* * *

 

It didn’t take much to convince Chuck that Rachel needed the workouts that my sims could provide, so for the next three days she and I hacked and scrapped our way through the kind of mayhem usually reserved for action adventure movies and war zones. It was a blast.

Rachel also opened up about her parents and who might be coming after her. She was willing enough to answer my questions, but understandably, she kept trying to make sense of her parents’ deaths, and they didn’t. She wasn’t in line to take over her parents’ positions at their company – in fact, she wasn’t even interested in the business. What she wanted to pursue were the antiques she’d mentioned days ago. Her college degree was in history, one of her college internships had been with Sotheby’s, the big auction house, and she’d worked part time in her grandmother’s New York antique shop in high school. These days, she was a junior analyst at Christie’s, the other best-known auction house. But though she wasn’t part of the day-to-day running of her parents’ business, she was the largest stockholder, which might play in takeover bids or other corporate shenanigans.

I spent time on the computer, researching what she told me, doing the tedious legwork that military ops require if they’re done right, the stuff you never read about in the comics because it’s not sexy, it’s not more-stuff-blows-up. Sometimes it’s boring as hell. I was grateful to let off steam in the sims.

As Rachel got into the sims, we covered how to get out of a house when the bad guys were at the door, car pursuit, hand-to-hand stuff, all the usual bits. I finally popped my claws for her and explained that the bones underneath the adamantium were mine. She made that silent o with her mouth and asked to touch them. I let her, and kept my thoughts only on what we’d been doing for the past hour.

“I don’t pick up your thoughts, Logan,” Rachel mused after a long session at the computer. We’d taken a break to eat lunch on the terrace. “I see where something has been in time, even when it’s a person.”

I swallowed my mouthful of sandwich. “Does the Professor help you figure out what you can do?”

She passed me the bowl of chips. “Mostly, he helps me focus. Every second I get a sense of where something I touch has been. There’s so much to sort through, and I’m learning where to focus and what to let go. When I touch a person, I get their emotions, too. And I’m starting to pick up things more than an hour old. Do you know that Chippendale chest the Professor has in the library? I touched it this morning, and it told me that the inlay on the left side had had a little piece replaced about fifty years ago. That was amazing. Or this bowl – someone used it for cereal this morning, and that was four hours ago. Someone very big, and… metal?”

I arched an eyebrow as I took the bowl. “Colossus. Peter Rasputin. I’ve seen him use this bowl. But maybe you see somethin’ else, Rachel. Why’d you just hand this to me? I didn’t ask for the chips.”

She stilled. At first, I thought she was going to shut down as she’d done when she first came here, but instead she was thinking hard, eyes flitting around unaware as she thought about my question.

“I... think…when I picked up the bowl, I knew that you were going to hold it.”

“Okay,” I ventured. I’d thought about grabbing some chips once I’d swallowed, but that’s as far as I’d gone with it. Could Rachel have picked that up from the bowl? And how could we prove that she had?

“Okay,” I repeated, and reached for her hand. I pressed it flat on the balustrade where we sat overlooking the lawn. “Feel the stone, Rachel. See if it tells you who will be out here in the next hour.”

She looked at me askance. “You want me to…”

“Don’t think about it. Just say whatever comes into mind when you touch the stone.”

“Okay,” she said. Her eyes went blank, then lit with that odd glow. She flicked me a glance. “Ororo?”

I nodded acceptance. “Eat your lunch.”

We concentrated on the food, gradually going back to conversation about nothing until I’d almost forgotten about oracles on stone patios. Then the door opened behind us, and ‘Ro walked towards us.

Rachel and I exchanged looks. “Hang on a minute,” I said.

I crossed to ‘Ro before she reached us at the balustrade. “Do me a favor,” I said softly. “Go back inside, grab the first person you meet, and come back out here. Don’t say anythin’. Just nod.”

‘Ro’s gaze flicked towards Rachel, then back to me, looking a question.

I nodded once. She turned on her heel and disappeared while I ambled back to Rachel, my face absolutely expressionless.

“What’s the stone tell you now?”

Rachel trusted me enough to touch the stone again. She shut her eyes, quickly opened them again.

“I still sense Ororo, but there’s someone else. A girl. I don’t know her. Asian… Chinese, maybe? Younger than me. Something with fireworks?”

I picked up my sandwich again, but I had to force myself to take another bite while I waited for ‘Ro to come back. About two minutes later, she did, and as I expected, she had Jubilee with her. Rachel had pegged Jube down to her talent.

I waved, flicking Jubilee and ‘Ro our sign to back off, so both retreated. Then I regarded Rachel.

“All right, you nailed that cold. So you see into the past and at least a few minutes into the future.”

Rachel shivered. “That is so creepy. What am I going to do?”

“I dunno,” I replied, pinning her gaze with mine. “What do you want to do?”

“Damn it,” she mouthed forcefully, but the words were quiet. “Should I tell Professor Xavier…?”

“Could. But before you freak, think about it. You just found yourself a great alarm clock.”

“I just… what?” She looked at me with a frown.

“When someone comes after you, Rachel, you’ll know at least a few minutes ahead. You’ll have time to get out of the way.”

That got her to think. She stared at the stone under her plate, then looked up at me. Her lips actually curved up in a ghost of a smile.

“I will, won’t I?” Her grin widened.

“Don’t get cocky, kid,” I mock growled. “You ain’t near fast enough on your sim drills yet.”

She shrugged a what-can-I-say? look, but her smile didn’t fade. “Thanks, Logan-kyoshi. Thanks a lot.”

She grabbed her plate and ran back into the mansion, probably to find Chuck or Jean to talk about what she’d just let herself discover.

I finished my sandwich. Eventually I slumped into one of the cushioned chairs, propped my feet up on the balustrade, and plunked the potato chip bowl in my lap. I munched thoughtfully. I wondered how long it’d be before Chuck and I had another discussion about the woman who lived in the past, present, and future all at the same time.

 

* * *

 

The control freaks of the world won’t like my condensation of the next several days, because they want all the whys and wherefores. I’m fine with saying that Chuck did chat me up about Rachel, and was pleased at how well I’d helped her along. Seems that she trusted me. That left me with mixed feelings – satisfaction that I’d earned that trust, and apprehension that I wouldn’t keep it. Not that I don’t trust myself… but nasty people have a nasty habit of jumping out at me, and I’m no angel when I’m surprised. Whoever was after Rachel would jump out before long, and I didn’t want her caught in the crossfire.

I kept pushing the sims. I even cranked up a couple of the Hellfire and Armageddon sims I’d cut for the X-Men, just to get Rachel used to the noise. Unexpectedly, she liked them. I like mayhem and chaos because I can let the beast out, and the over-the-top sims let me do that without killing anyone. Dunno about her – maybe she felt safe in the Danger Room. Maybe she liked the catharsis. Whatever the reason, when I howled and slashed my way through them, Rachel was right there, and she gave my healing factor a workout. After a week, I had a hell of a _bushi_ berserker on my hands in Rachel Osaka.

What went hand-in-hand with the sim work and computer searches was Rachel’s work with Chuck and Jean. I didn’t ask about that, but I listened when Rachel talked. She’d started to let the sensations come to her without judgment. I likened it to the kind of meditation where you consider nasty stuff without splattering it all over yourself. That’s never been my strong suit, so I gave her points for facing something that hard.

Maybe my condensation would be easier to take if I told you that I do so to get to the part you’re waiting for. You know the people who killed Rachel’s parents are gonna make an appearance. If they don’t, I don’t have a story.

Here’s how it happened.

I’d gotten up, enjoyed a shower, puttered through breakfast, and was thinking about what to teach the kiddies when Rachel burst into the kitchen.

“Logan!” Her voice was high and strained. “They’ll be here in an hour. Maybe a little more. They’re coming here!”

I got out of my chair, and Rachel didn’t hesitate to reach out to me. “Who’s comin’ here?”

“Someone from my parents’ company,” Rachel answered, her words tumbling over themselves. Her hands shook on my arm. “Two people, I mean. I felt them in the floor of the first floor hallway. I know them both. One of them – Susa – is nice enough. But Seiji Tanaka is a creep, and I don’t understand why he would come here, because my parents knew I didn’t like him –”

“You got your duffel?”

Rachel swallowed, took a breath to steady herself, and nodded.

I pushed her towards the kitchen door. “Get it. Bottom of the stairs in five minutes. Go!”

She ran. I followed more slowly, but with no less purpose. I’d told Rachel three weeks ago to keep a bag packed in case we had to make a run from the mansion, and I’d done the same. I snagged mine and strode down the hall to knock on Jean’s door. She opened it immediately.

“Two people connected to Rachel will be here in an hour. Tell Chuck. I’m outa here with the kid until we know what’s up.”

I headed back towards the stairs without waiting for Jean to react. “Where are you going?” she shouted, running after me.

“Dunno!” I called. “And if I dunno, neither do you or Chuck!”

I took the stairs two at a time, grabbed Rachel’s hand as I hit the floor, and headed for the garage. My bike was there, gassed and ready. For obvious reasons, I’m not the guy to wear a helmet, but I grabbed one from Scott’s bike and tossed it to Rachel. By the time she got it on, I had our duffels stowed.

“Get on!” I shouted as I cranked the bike to life.

She threw a leg over the seat, pulled herself tightly against my back, and we were gone.

 

* * *

 

It doesn’t take a dummy to figure out that I’d lied to Jean about where I intended to go. But a little smoke never hurt to cover my tracks, and neither Jean nor Chuck would pry for details until after whoever showed up at the mansion was gone. I’d planned weeks ago how I wanted to play this scenario, so as soon as I got out of the mansion’s casual line of sight, I cut across the road to a commonly used dirt bike trail. From there, I wound around the loops and turns until we were a couple of miles from the mansion, then I cut away from the path across some rocks, and went from there to a small space under the trees that was unremarkable and unlikely to attract the local teens looking for whatever they could find.

I silenced the bike and got off. I took an experimental sniff, heard nothing but insects and birds, saw everything as normal as the outdoors gets without people crashing around, and decided this was as good a spot to spend a couple of hours as any. I made myself comfortable atop a suitable rock.

Rachel got her helmet off. “Now what?”

I shrugged. “Sit and wait. Chuck’ll yell when your two trailers are gone.”

Rachel considered that, clambered off the bike, and looked around her. “Where are we?”

“Somewhere,” I replied. “Better you don’t think about it too much. If anyone’s attuned to you, you won’t give them much to go on. And I should still be an unknown to those clowns, so it doesn’t matter that I know where we are.”

Rachel stood awkwardly, trying to sort out what to do with herself. Eventually she decided to sit beside me. When she was settled, her hand snaked out to touch my arm.

I looked down at her fingers. “What’s that for?”

“You aren’t thinking about the gym, but something real. I want to know what you’re thinking about. What I should be thinking about.”

I wasn’t thinking about anything particularly gruesome at the moment, so I let her hand stay. “Thought you didn’t pick up thoughts.”

“You’re right. I don’t,” she admitted. “I think I’m an empath – I pick up emotions. But I pick up other things, too – time, place, some extra pieces. I call those omens – things that tell me about the past or future – though I’m no prophet or anything.”

“You’re not a yogensha, eh?”

She laughed. “Hardly.”

I looked around us again, glanced back at Rachel’s glowing, faraway eyes, her brow slightly wrinkled as she concentrated. “Sounds like a good name. Omen.”

“You… mean like all the other mutants have. Storm, Cyclops, Shadowcat. A name you give yourself.”

I nodded.

“Your name is different. It doesn’t say anything about your talents. Why did you choose Wolverine?”

“So they told you about that, did they?”

“Didn’t you expect me to check you out? You spend a lot of time pointing sharp things at me.”

I grinned. “That I do. But I haven’t marked your hide while I’m at it – a favor you haven’t returned.”

“You told me to,” Rachel laughed in exasperation.” You said I couldn’t hurt you.”

“You can’t.”

“Hmm, Mr. Macho. But you’re avoiding my question.”

I couldn’t help it, couldn’t keep myself from recalling one of the few memories I had about how I acquired my name and my adamantium. Rachel’s hand twitched on my arm, so I thought about that memory good and hard. She twitched again, but didn’t let go. So I met her eyes squarely.

“Katanas ain’t the only things that draw blood, kid. But since you asked, the Wolverine was my code name when I worked in black ops. When I was an experiment. I’m told the kids at the school think it’s the perfect name for me because I’m a mean S.O.B.”

“They do not,” Rachel protested. “You’re a hard man to please, you don’t suffer fools well, you’re not the easiest person to talk to –”

I laughed.

“ – and you’re even tougher than you say, but you’ve had to be, and you’ve kept a lot of the people at the school safe. They know that. You’re an honorable man, Logan. Maybe you don’t let them remind you of that often enough.”

She was a lot more perceptive than I was comfortable with, so I gave her a grudging smile. “Touché.”

Rachel gave me a slow smile in return, both shy at how she’d pushed, but aware that she’d won something I didn’t grant people often, and appreciated my forbearance. She took her hand away, and I admit that I breathed easier.

“So… Omen, hmm?” she seemed to roll it around in her mind, then looked back at me. “I like it.”

I caught just a whiff of someone, heard just the smallest twig snap…

“Do you trust me?” I whispered, looking behind Rachel.

She caught my mood change and stilled. Her heart rate kicked up. “Yes,” she replied just as quietly. Adrenaline was in her scent, and her eyes glowed brighter than I’d seen before. “He’s coming from the north.”

“Yup.”

I pulled her off the rock, drew her to the tree nearest to where I’d heard the sound, and backed her against it. Then I kissed her.

In and around my attention on whoever was trying very hard to sneak up on us, I realized that Rachel might be surprised at my tactic, but she didn’t argue with it. In fact, she seemed to forget just about everything else to lean into me. Ordinarily, I would’ve let a whole other set of drives kick in. But I held the lip lock only long enough to let the skulker think I was completely deaf. When he was on the other side of the tree, I lunged out of my apparent distraction and caught the bastard drawing a knife –

A semi automatic pistol was in his other hand.

Anytime anyone pulls a weapon on me, I hit hard first and ask questions later. This was no exception –time slowed to a crawl and I moved very fast. I knocked the gun away, popped my claws, ran him through, and let him fall before Rachel could gasp. Once he was down, I had time to notice that he was Japanese, about twenty-five, dressed like a tourist in a polo shirt and slacks. He still recoiled from the fall when he tried to grope for his pistol. I kicked the weapon further away, scanned around us for anyone else, stamped on the other wrist when he brought the blade around to bear, pushed Rachel behind me. All of that took less time to happen than to describe.

“You know him?” I asked Rachel gruffly when it was clear I’d hit the guy too hard for him to do more than lie there and bleed.

“No,” she whispered. Her voice was strangled and high, her face was white, and her hands were knotted together over her mouth.

“Look away,” I told her, sheathing one set of claws. I hauled our little sneak up by his shirt and put claws in his face. “Who’re you lookin’ for, bub? Anybody I know?”

He spat something at me in Japanese, so I repeated my question in the same language with a few extra adjectives that I hoped Rachel didn’t know. I got the same stuff back, and the look in his eyes was fierce, without recognition of the pain he was in. He’d done this before.

I let him drop to the ground. His weapons were military quality, not standard issue, so he was likely a professional hunter, and not one with kidnapping on his mind –

Rachel reached past me to touch the man’s leg. He was too busy dying to take advantage of her, but I didn’t care for her move and pulled her away.

“No! I can tell –” Rachel shoved me off and touched the guy again. Her eyes lit, so I stood by to make sure that the wounded man didn’t suddenly get the energy to grab her. After a few seconds, she stumbled away. I think the last rattle of breath from the sneak came first, but Rachel’s retching was a close second. I let the body lie and went to Rachel, at least to hold her hair out of her face as she heaved out what little was in her stomach.

When her body stopped spasming, I dug out one of the water bottles I’d stowed in my duffel, unscrewed the cap, and gave it to Rachel to rinse out her mouth. She took it wordlessly, still fighting between throwing up and crying.

“He’s a m-m-mutant,” Rachel croaked. She took a sip of water, swished it around, and spat it out. “He was looking for me. This was just a job for him. He was with two others. He was the one able to sense where I am. The other two aren’t mutants. One is Seiji. The other one is Susa. He – he was going to kill me. He knew he was dying, and the pain was overwhelming… he knew!”

And with that, she retched again.

I grimaced. “Sorry you had to see that, Rachel.”

“It wasn’t as bad as seeing my parents shot,” she blurted, and that set her off retching again. There was nothing left in her stomach to throw up, so she just heaved uncontrollably until she forced herself to calm.

I hoped Rachel was too upset to pick up anything from me, because right now I was callously thinking about putting some distance between us and a dead man perforated with my signature marks. I dragged the body down to the nearest ravine and let it roll down underneath the brush, out of at least casual sight. I sliced the gun and the knife and tossed both after him. Then I dug into my jeans pocket and pulled out one of the X-Men cell phones I usually ignored.

‘Ro answered right away. I said a few terse words about what had happened, and confirmed that Rachel and I were fine.

“Where are our two friends?”

“They just left,” ‘Ro replied. “I’ll see if I can get the Professor. Call you back.”

“Make it fast, ‘Ro. We’re outa here.”

I stuffed the phone back in my jeans, then led Rachel to the bike. “C’mon, darlin’. Time to go.”

I got her on the bike, cranked it up, and drove deeper into the woods. She clung to me, not looking where we were going, and if I didn’t pick up emotions through my skin the way she did, the white knuckles of her hands around my waist told just as clear a story. I let her alone, and not just by choice. Chuck chose that moment to tune into my head rather than the phone, and for once, I was glad he didn’t stick to conventional means of conversation. I could keep moving, and Rachel didn’t have to hear what we said.

_Wolverine? How’s Rachel?_

I smirked. Chuck never called me that unless I was working _. Pretty sick. But not so sick that she didn’t try to read the guy before he died. Says he was a mutant who could track her, and he worked with the two nonmutants who visited you. I say he was a pro lookin’ to take her down._

_You are both right about the one who followed you. He was able to sense something about Rachel’s talent well enough to track her as a bloodhound follows scent. I also concur with her assessment of the two who came here. I sensed no mutant talents from either._

_Any idea where they’re goin’?_

_They went down the main road. Yes, they’re at the intersection with Willard Crossing. I believe they expected to rendezvous with their compatriot in a few minutes another six or seven miles down the road._

_He won’t make it,_ I growled. _It ain’t nice to ask, but if Kitty could leave the remains in about two meters of granite, it’d help._

Kitty Pryde was about fifteen, and as cute and wholesome a girl as you’d ever want to see. She was also an X-Man, and had seen things a lot of soldiers hadn’t. Still, asking her to phase a body through rock and leave it there wasn’t something I liked to ask, even though it’d avoid anyone having to answer questions why I’d offed an assassin, and keep Rachel’s name out of the news. I’m no mind reader, but I got a vague sense from Chuck that he figured all that out almost as fast as I did and was giving it serious consideration. Good. Sometimes the revered professor of the Xavier Institute took nobility to a fault, and it was refreshing to think he could get past that for a practical reason.

 _Such flagrant disregard of the law is not something to contemplate lightly, Logan,_ Chuck chided.

 _Neither was sneakin’ up behind me in a piss-poor murder attempt,_ I retorted. _That’s what Rachel picked up from him. I’ve got his ID. Check him out in your massive computer brain, Chuck. Fujiwara Kobiashi out of Tokyo. License number…_

I apparently gave Chuck enough to think about that he didn’t reply, so I kept riding. I headed quickly back to the mansion, intending to put Rachel back in the hall where her two trailers had just been to see what she could read of their intent. I wanted to get a whiff of them, too, in case I had to track them. Depending on what we found out, we’d decide whether we hunkered down there or kept moving.

I explained this to Rachel over the roar of the bike, and she didn’t protest. But her grip around my waist was tight and her body shook. When I drove into the mansion garage, I didn’t get off the bike right away, but half turned towards her and put my hands over hers.

“You hangin’ in there, darlin’?”

She stayed tightly pressed against my back. “No. But I can do what we need to do.”

I squeezed her hands encouragingly. “Fair enough. Let’s get upstairs before the omens get any fainter.”

By the time Jean and ‘Ro came to join us in the library where Chuck had seen our two unwanted visitors, I’d gotten a pale scent of both. Rachel, however, was still touching the chair where one of them had sat. I held off ‘Ro and Jean to give Rachel space to pick up whatever. She put her hands flat against the seat of the chair, shut her eyes, and stilled her body, even unbreathing for a moment.

“Here,” ‘Ro distracted me, pushing a computer printout into my hands. “Scott found this about the man who followed you. It looks like you were right about him being a professional assassin. And Kitty, Kurt, and Anna Marie said to tell you that you owe them a trip to Coaster World?”

‘Ro looked quizzical, so she didn’t know what the kids had done. If Rogue had been involved, it’d been quick and matter-of-fact. She was a tough kid, and not one to dwell on doing what was needed. I imagined that she’d gotten the fuzzy elf to bampf around until he’d found the sneak, then she’d borrowed a bit of Kitty’s phasing abilities to help drag the body through the rocks.

“They’re right. Any day they want, once this is over.”

“Andrew Skyler said you’d want these, too,” Jean chimed in. She handed me two pieces of drawing paper, each of which revealed a beautiful portrait in purple pencil. Andrew had come into his talents early. He was about seven with slanting eyes and silky hair in strange shades of purple, and ears that were more elfin fantasy than human. But the kid also had a photographic memory for faces and a drawing talent second to none. The two Japanese stared at me from the paper almost as living images.

“Tell Andrew he’s drawn himself a ticket to Coaster World, too. Rachel, take a look.”

When she glanced at the portraits, her hand went to her mouth. “That’s Seiji Tanaka. And Susa Omara. Where did you get those?”

“Thank a little purple pixie,” Jean said. “Do you need Scott to run the same search on them, Logan?”

“Done two weeks ago.” I grinned at Jean’s surprised look. “I know you like the packagin’, Red, but give a guy credit for brains, eh? I can mine a computer net just as well as Ol’ Red Eyes.”

Jean looked sheepish, then nonplussed as ‘Ro laughed and pulled her out of the library.

I looked to Rachel. “Whaddaya think, kid?”

She pulled her arms around herself as she had when she’d first arrived here, and she swallowed. Her face was pale. “I’m scared, Logan. Really scared. I don’t like being this scared, and I don’t like hiding and waiting for someone to come after me. Maybe I should just stay here. But if I could do something, find out why they want me, maybe that would help this stop sooner.”

“Gets my vote,” I nodded. “But before you vote, remember that this won’t be a sim. It might be just as ugly as what just happened. Might be worse. No guarantees.”

I’ll give Rachel this – she actually thought about what I said. Just as she’d done so many times before, she took a deep breath to steady herself. Her eyes turned hard. She looked straight at me and nodded.

“I know. I mean, I don’t really know, but I understand. And I still want to do something.”

I nodded. “Then I’m with you. I got just one question.”

“What?”

“What’re we doin’?”

Rachel shut her eyes, concentrating. “I think they’re heading back to the West Coast office. San Francisco. But they might be going to the city, too – New York City. I sensed both.”

“I can help with that,” Chuck said as he wheeled into the library, followed by ‘Ro and Jean. “I did a little reading of my own while our guests were here, and you have interpreted correctly, Rachel. Ms. Omara intends to return to San Francisco immediately. Mr. Tanaka seems to be quite intent on an errand in New York City before he returns to California. But he intends to be back in San Francisco by next Thursday.”

“The day my parents’ will is read.” Rachel murmured.

“I did note that from Mr. Tanaka,” Chuck agreed.

Rachel frowned. “I wonder why that matters to Seiji. I already know what’s in my parents’ will. Most of their stock in the company does go to me, but it’s in a trust. I already have stock of my own, enough to work in whatever I field I want. The houses and such are quite modest, and shouldn’t be of any interest to anyone. There were personal bequests in the will, but nothing went to Seiji.”

“Are you supposed to be there when they read the will?” Jean asked.

Rachel nodded. “It’s just a formality, as far as I’m concerned, because I already know what will be said. But I’m their heir, and I should be there.”

“Next Thursday, eh?” I considered. “Today’s Tuesday. That gives us eight full days.”

“What are you thinking, Logan?” Charles asked.

I looked up. “They’ve been here. Their little sneak won’t be meetin’ ‘em, so they’ll know somethin’s happened. So I wouldn’t stay here. Rachel’s got to be in San Francisco when they read the will. Somebody’s probably watchin’ the bus stations and the airports.”

I looked around the room. Everyone was with me so far. I grinned perversely.

“I’m thinkin’ road trip.”

 

* * *

 

As I expected, there was a lot of noise about Rachel and me heading west on my Harley, most of it from Chuck and Jean. ‘Ro kept her silence, but I knew her well enough to interpret the look she gave me. She’d grown up tough, and was streetwise as well as book savvy. She tended to agree with me that staying under the radar was the smartest thing to do. What gratified me was that Rachel looked up and suddenly announced that she wanted to go, hog and all, without any prompting from anyone. That cut the noise fast enough. There were a few word flurries after that, most of them details about how to keep in touch if something happened, but the tones and smells were resigned, reluctant – defeated. The meeting broke up after that, and Rachel and I separated to pack some extra gear.

“Nothing fancy, kid,” I prompted, as she headed up to her room. “Jeans, tees, a jacket, rain gear. Leave the high heels. Take stuff you can move in. Leather bike gear if you’ve got it.”

“I know, Logan. You’ve drilled that into me over the last month,” she nodded, venturing a half smile. She was still scared, but moving helped to dissipate that.

“Okay. See you in ten.”

After I picked up my own stuff, I stopped down in the X-Men section for a couple of comm units and some other trinkets. They were more than I typically liked to carry, but something told me they might come in handy if we got into a fight.

In less than ten, I was back in the garage. Rachel was already next to my bike with her helmet on. She’d changed her jeans for leather pants, and her jacket and boots were heavy enough for a road trip. Like my gear, hers was nothing provocative, nothing flashy – she’d learned well.

“Here,” I said, tossing her one of the comm units. I pointed to mine already in my ear. “Good thing to have in case we get separated, or if we want to talk over the bike.”

She put it on while I stowed our gear, replaced her helmet, and waited for me to get on. I cranked the bike up, and we were gone.

I let ten minutes go by in silence as we left Westchester behind and headed west. Once Rachel settled in behind me and the bike warmed to the road, I turned a hair of my attention to other things.

“Hey, kid.”

“Logan?”

“So what’s the real reason you agreed to this road trip? We coulda taken a car if you’d wanted.”

“I thought you thought this was better.”

I grinned to myself. “Come on, Rachel.”

“What?” she asked after a few seconds, stalling.

“Your adrenaline spiked enough for me to smell it just after Chuck and Red started yakkin’. Your pupils dilated at the same time, and your heart rate went up. You made some kinda decision.”

“Nobody can keep any secrets around you. Sometimes it’s a pain.”

Now I laughed. “So I hear. So what’s the deal?”

Hands tightened on my ribs. “If you laugh at me, I’ll aim for your throat the next time we spar.”

“Fair enough.”

“Okay. Point One: I realized a few days ago that I’ve gotten a lot more comfortable with all these impressions I get every time I touch something. I’ve learned how to filter what I pick up, how to pick out what’s important, and how not to flinch when it all comes in. Most importantly, I’ve learned how to let it go after. Sometimes, I actually enjoy the first surge. I have a lot more to learn, but now I know what I have to learn, and how to go about it.

“Point Two: I used to love traveling with my parents, going on long hikes with my father, eating new food with my mother. They encouraged me to see new things, try new things. I realized how isolated I’ve made myself. So when you suggested the road trip, I thought it would be a way to stay safe until we get to San Francisco, and give me the chance to try new things – to become me, the mutant, Omen. And if I got into trouble, I’d be with the best person I know to help me handle it.”

I didn’t have the least urge to laugh. High honor, indeed. “Thank you, darlin’.”

Rachel’s hands tightened around my waist again.

“You’ve taught me to take things as straight as they come, that I can handle it,” she said after a few seconds. “Traveling by car wouldn’t be the same. This is… so much more open, more free. I wanted that. In case you wanted to know.”

“Matches my way of thinkin’.”

I let the conversation lapse. Rachel had given me a lot to think about as the miles unwound.

I’ve said before what a surreal thing it is to lose myself on the road – the hours in a white noise bubble of engine roar... the unending stream of air that cools as well as burns as the miles unreel... the vibrations of the bike that course through me like a painless electric jolt... the scenes from the road that unfold before and fade behind like a weird kind of movie. This ride was no different, except that I had a woman’s hands resting against my ribs like a caress. That, I discovered, added new dimensions. On the one hand, having a woman that close was something to savor. On the other, Rachel’s trouble was never out of my thoughts, and that heightened my awareness of everything – not like being in a fight did, but this might be prep for one, so my senses were fully engaged. By the time we made it to someplace in Ohio, I was glad to stand down, but sorry to lose the feel of Rachel against my back.

We stopped at a small cabin that Chuck owned, out in the middle of nowhere. He had similar places stashed across the country, safe houses in case of emergencies. This one was small but clean, isolated from prying eyes, and well maintained – better than most flophouses. I wheeled the bike into the shed around back to keep it out of sight, and came back to the cabin with the two duffels to find Rachel had already gone inside. I shook my head and ducked in quickly to make sure no one had been waiting for us. The place was clear. Rachel rummaged through the tiny kitchen, looking at what was in the fridge.

“Next time, wait ‘til I run the sweep before you go inside,” I said gruffly, putting the duffels on a chair.

She looked up. “I ran the sweep, just like in the sim. But you’re right; I should have waited. I just….”

“Hate havin’ to rely on someone else? I hear ya, darlin’. But for the next few days, we have to rely on each other, like it’s one big sim.”

She sighed, but more because of the trouble she was in rather than annoyance at me. “Does dinner have to be a sim? There’s some spaghetti and things for sauce, and I haven’t cooked in weeks.”

“Are you any good?” I mock growled, giving her a skeptical look. “’Cause if you’re not, I’ll take my chances with my cookin’.”

“I am very good.” She tossed her head and went back to looking in the fridge. “I’ve been to classes in Provence, Hong Kong, and San Francisco.”

“Just to boil noodles and nuke Ragu? It ain’t that hard, darlin’.”

“Go sweep the cabin again, Logan,” she retorted, laughing and brandishing a saucepan. “You do what you do best, and I’ll do what I do best.”

“Deal,” I grinned, and left her to the food.

Sweeping the place took all of three minutes, so I did it twice to stay out of Rachel’s hair while she did whatever in the kitchen. I also took a gander outside, decided it was safe enough for a smoke, so enjoyed my stogie while I made a quick reconnoiter around the cabin. Only animals had passed by for some days. The quiet of the place calmed me, especially after so much road noise. Once my cigar was gone, I took a deep breath of green air and was grateful for it.

Enough time had passed that I figured Rachel must’ve finished the spaghetti by now, so I strolled back inside. I found Rachel just coming out of one of the small rooms, toweling her wet hair and dressed in a clean tee shirt and jeans.

“You looked like you were meditating, so I took advantage of the shower,” she explained. “It feels so good to get clean. If you want to do the same, the sauce won’t be ready for another fifteen minutes or so.”

“I’ll take you up on that,” I nodded, and picked up my duffel.

The cabin had two bedrooms but only one bathroom, so I left my stuff in the room that Rachel didn’t take and spent the next fifteen minutes soaking up hot water and soap. She was right – it felt good to unwind and loosen tight muscles. While I dried off and dressed, I smelled dinner and Rachel’s happiness.

The spaghetti was a lot better than noodles slopped with Ragu. Rachel might have started with a can of tomatoes, but given that this was Chuck’s cabin, she’d found a host of other ingredients to put into the base, and the result was top notch. There wasn’t much to go with it besides water and canned fruit. I would have liked a beer or two.

We didn’t talk much until we’d eaten most of the meal. I remembered that someone had once taught me that to concentrate on the food was to pay reverence to it. I was glad to have that little snippet, even if I didn’t remember where it fit. But once the edge of our hunger was gone, we talked quietly of nothing in particular, which continued while we cleaned up. I retreated to the couch, slid down until I was comfortably slumped in the corner, and put my bare feet up on the coffee table. After a moment’s hesitation, Rachel curled next to me and put her hand on my arm.

I looked a question at her. “What’re you tryin’ to read this time?”

“I don’t know,” she said frowning. “Maybe I’m trying to sort out all this stuff I pick up. The difference between things and people, the empathic part, I think I understand. Seeing the past, I think I understand. But seeing the future... that’s a lot more confusing. The future comes to me in layers. Maybe the top layers are what’re most likely to happen, and the ones underneath are what’re less likely. Professor X talked about world line travel – very mathematical. I didn’t understand the esoteric points of it. Maybe I pick up intent.”

Maybe I imagined it, but it didn’t feel like Rachel was trying to sort out her talents, even though her eyes glowed. Was she having second thoughts about whether she could trust me or not?

I took her hand firmly in mine and held it up before her. “If there’s somethin’ you wanna ask, ask.”

“Are you sure you’ll answer me?” she sat up to look at me straightly.

“Why not?”

“Okay,” she said slowly. “Regardless of what I ask?”

“Yup.”

You’re probably way ahead of me, but it surprised me when she leaned in and brushed a kiss on my lips. It was tentative, exploratory, scented with warm female pheromones. I did my best not to answer her touch with my own, to take advantage of what she offered.

“You’ve got a hell of a way of askin’, darlin’.”

“You said you’d answer me. So… back in the forest, when the little sneak showed up, did you kiss me just to draw him out, or…”

She winced despite herself and sat back, her face reddening. “You must think I’m sick. I mean, someone died, and… oh, damn it. This isn’t coming out right.”

Rachel might have been flustered, but between her scent and her hand on my arm, I wasn’t. Still, I kept as tight a hold on myself as I ever had.

“Yeah, someone died. Never the way I want things to go, but it can happen when people do stupid things like attempted murder. And yeah, I started to kiss you because it was the most obvious way to draw in the little sneak. But once we started… I wish we hadn’t been interrupted. So what’s your excuse?”

Rachel’s eyes widened at my challenge, but a small smile touched her lips.

“I don’t need one,” she said, and leaned in again.

I am far from a celibate man, though I tend to go for long stretches without indulging. I have a lot of enemies. I don’t ever want another woman I loved to be a target for the bastards who harry me, and I don’t ever want to outlive her. So, at first I didn’t let myself react. But Rachel was an experienced woman, and I’d done too good a job of teaching her to be that _bushi_ berserker. I’d taught her how to play by nobody's rules but her own, to take advantage of whatever presented itself. When she turned my lessons back on me, adamantium had never been so useless.

I gave her what she wanted, my pulse quickening under her fingers, my pheromones at full roar, my arousal subvocalized on a frequency she couldn’t hear but surely felt. It was impossible not to. Rachel was already my kind of woman in any way that mattered, and now that she’d decided what she wanted, the only thing to do was to take her in my arms and kiss her like she was mine.

Every smell and sound and sight and touch burned into my sieve of a brain like a brand. The way she moved, the shape of her body, and the arch of her back as my touches aroused her…. To savor her caresses over my skin, smell her scent mingled with mine, hear her voice whisper my name with so much want in it… to lose myself with her in that ultimate merging… those things both soothed and consumed me. In another world, she might be a rich woman with a thousand possibilities at her fingertips, and I might be a loner with an enigmatic name and a set of skills that don’t make for a peaceful life. But in this one, we were one.

Life reduced to survival-of-the-species basics – sex, food, shelter, sleep. We kept moving across the country, though we didn’t start as early in the morning as we might have, and we stopped early enough in the afternoon that we had the night to ourselves. We did a steady four to five hundred miles a day, more out west where we flew on the straight, empty roads. We never ventured into anyplace other than a gas station, a grocery store, or a modest motel. The first time I tried to stop at a pool hall to hustle enough money for dinner and a room, Rachel told me she was carrying enough cash to feed an army for a month, all in unmarked, nonsequential bills. As numb as she might have been when she arrived at the mansion, she’d been awake enough to bring the cash with her, so we didn’t have to make any bank transactions that would help someone find her.

Other times, I might have missed the usual mayhem I find on the road. But during the day, I had Rachel to savor behind me on the bike, to build my anticipation of what waited for us when we stood down each evening. When we stopped, Rachel told me in an infinite number of ways that she was happier than she’d been in a long time. I would have been happy to stay in this cocoon, savoring a woman who reminded me what it was like to escape darkness, a woman who treasured me as much as I treasured her.

Neither of us wanted to cross the Oregon-California border. We didn’t want to see the Cascades fall behind us, or feel the coast of California warm as we drew near San Francisco. We spent our last two days north of the city under the trees. Rachel cried the night before we were to enter the city. I didn’t like it any more than she did. That lent things a certain intensity.

Long before dawn the next morning, I geared up as thoroughly as if this were a military operation. I put Rachel through the drill – comm links charged, gadgets primed, both of us calm and businesslike. Rachel fidgeted with her jacket zipper, but was as quiet as I was. Still, I drew her close.

“I don’t expect anythin’ to go down other than a lot of noise because you showed up,” I murmured, rubbing her back slowly. “We won’t give anyone time to react, but we won’t count just on that. We go in expectin’ trouble, which’ll help us avoid it.”

“The best defense is a good offense,” Rachel smiled crookedly and laid her head against my shoulder. “I think I’ve heard you say that, oh, maybe a million times before.”

“Damn’ straight,” I grinned. “We go in with the works, even down to code names. As soon as we get on the hog, you’re Omen, and I’m the Wolverine.”

She nodded. “I’ll be honest – as comic book dumb as it sounds, I’d feel a lot better with a katana.”

“Don’t blame you, darlin’. But if we go in loaded for bear, we take the rap if anythin’ happens. We both can fight if it comes to that. Corporate types don’t generally push that hard.”

Rachel shrugged. “Just so you know, there’s a pair of antique katanas in the reception area of my parents’ offices. They’re very old, but superbly forged. My father took great pride in practicing with them regularly. They’re still quite serviceable.”

“Good to know. Let’s get to it.”

I got on the bike and kicked the engine to life. I waited for her to climb on. As we headed out, she nestled against my back like she belonged there.

The road into San Francisco was dark and cool. The reading of the will was set for nine. We’d picked that up by having Jean access Rachel’s email back in Westchester, so if anyone traced the hit they’d be the width of the country wrong about where Rachel was. Chuck also confirmed it through his own channels, so we weren’t going to hit the wrong venue. Oddly enough, the meeting wasn’t at the lawyer’s office that I’d expected, but at her parents’ corporate headquarters. Suited me. All the players would be there. Our plan was to get there early enough for Rachel to get us in and for me to sweep the place before anyone noticed.

I made good use of the GPS box I’d picked up from the X-Men’s lab. I nailed the headquarters building and ran a full recon before we ventured in. Rachel used her access card to get us through the main doors and into the lobby.

“Anything?” I asked quietly in Japanese when I followed Rachel in. The lobby was tall, covered with marble, with a directory that listed thirty or more companies. Rachel had told me that this building didn’t house any of the development work for her parents’ company, just the North American corporate headquarters on a couple of the floors. I didn’t spot any security cameras, and the reception area was vacant at this hour. Still, despite the lack of overt observation, I kept my voice down so that only Rachel would hear.

“No one’s been here since yesterday evening,” she murmured as softly back, looking around. “There isn’t generally a night guard. No Susa or Seiji that I can sense.”

I nodded and pointed towards the elevators. Her parents’ offices were on the twentieth floor. Rachel’s access badge had the doors opening silently in seconds, and we rode up in equal silence. Easy.

Easy always made me suspicious, but I kept that to myself.

The elevator opened on a beautifully appointed reception area, dark and silent. As we walked out, I spotted a lot of antiques, though Japanese rather than the English ones that Rachel loved. I suppose anyone visiting the corporate bigwigs would be duly impressed with the caliber of the company given the niceties of the furniture. The pair of beautiful katanas that Rachel had mentioned weren’t paired with wakizashis, but they were honorably mounted on the wall with their scabbards. Before them sat an impressive samurai helmet on a stand. The receptionist’s desk was an old altar table that camouflaged the modern computer and telephone console. The pièce de résistance was a magnificent Torii gate that stood before the glass doors leading to the offices. It projected a carefully cultivated air of calm and serenity.

“I’ve always loved this,” Rachel whispered almost to herself as she passed the samurai helmet. She reached out to touch it gently. She paused, frowned.

“What’s wrong?” I asked immediately.

“This isn’t right,” she whispered, her eyes glowing. “It looks the same, but it’s not. This isn’t my father’s helmet. It was put here within the last two weeks.”

I didn’t know if that meant anything yet. “Noted. Keep movin’.”

I followed Rachel silently as she headed through the gate and into the maze of offices. She moved as warily as she’d learned, her scent telling me that she understood this was the real thing. At a door with a keypad beside it, she punched in a code. We stepped inside the darkened room and shut the door behind us.

This was her mother’s office. I moved ahead of Rachel to sweep the space, noting the elegance, admirable restraint, and beauty of the space as I checked for bugs and anything more subversive. I checked the desk quickly, and nodded to Rachel to sweep the computer and the files.

“My mother’s crane screen is gone,” Rachel murmured, putting her hand on the wall behind the desk where the screen must have hung. “The wall tells me it was here a week ago. And her Imari plates on the credenza are gone, too. What’s going on?”

I ran a gloved finger across the desk. A faint layer of dust coated it, more than marked the credenza behind the desk where Rachel indicated the missing plates should have been. “Any of it valuable?”

“All museum quality.”

I sniffed once, twice. I didn’t smell either of the scents I’d picked up in the mansion a week ago. The air was still and quiet. “Doesn’t smell like anyone’s been in here for a while, includin’ the cleanin’ crew. Better check your father’s office.”

We moved next door. This office had been visited more recently than the other, and nothing seemed out of place – except for the low antique table that sat in the middle of four chairs in the seating area.

“No dust,” I noted, looking at Rachel. She stretched out a hand without hesitation and shut her eyes. But her eyes flew open a split second later.

“This isn’t my father’s table. It’s a reproduction. It was put here two days ago. Someone’s replacing all the pieces with fakes.”

I pointed to the computer. “You have access to your parents’ files?”

She nodded.

“Start with email. Look for maintenance notices of work on the floor, anything that would get people out of the area so someone could swap stuff out, likely after hours.”

“On it.”

“I’ll check the rest of the floor.”

“Copy.”

I left Rachel running files and slipped out to scout. There were more keylocked offices I couldn’t get into without leaving signs of entry, but I checked the public conference areas, the small kitchen, the secretaries’ domains, all of them decorated with beautiful Japanese objects. I wondered how many had been replaced with fakes. I rifled a few file cabinets – I’d learned early on when to rely on a good set of lock picks rather than my claws – but it was ten minutes before I dug up anything of interest. Even then, it was an innocuous memo about weekly computer network maintenance, all at night over the course of three or four hours. Someone could have had time to take detailed photos and measurements on one night, have someone reproduce the object, then a week later swap out the real article for the replacement.

What if the Osakas had noticed the pilfering, and someone had them killed for it? The theft would have started in earnest once they were out of the picture – someone could have stripped their offices, locked them against prying eyes, and had more time to reproduce big items like screens and tables. If that someone knew about Rachel’s talent, they’d have seen her as a threat to the scheme if she ever set foot in her parents’ company headquarters, hence their attempts to find her. All very tidy.

“Wolverine to Omen. Headin’ back.”

“Copy.”

Rachel had the door cracked for me when I returned to her father’s office. I handed her the memo and summarized my theory in bare words as she read.

“The original memo’s dated before my parents were killed,” Rachel pointed to the date. “This one’s an update. But neither of my parents got the second one, even though it was sent to the corporate email list.”

“Someone could have taken your parents’ name out of that list, ” I pointed out.

“They probably did. But my parents had accounts set up to make sure they knew what was going on. These accounts were secure against tampering – or were supposed to be, to make sure that if something came up that my parents weren’t able to handle, messages were forwarded to a contingency chain of command. I checked those accounts, and none of them got these emails – but they did get other routine notices. So someone didn’t want the chain of command to know about these.”

“Are either of the two who came to Westchester in the chain of command?”

Rachel shook her head. “But I wonder…”

I waited her out.

“I wonder who was in charge of the antiques.”

“Any way to find out?”

“My mother would have known.”

The clock on Shiro Osaka’s desk showed it was close to seven. “We need to lie low until right before the meetin’. Here is probably safest because the thieves have already done their work. Somebody might get the idea to check your mother’s office because of the missin’ pieces. Do a quick search on the files again – personnel records, promotions, the antiques – then we need to get off in case anyone starts to monitor computer activity. We have a bit longer to look through any hardcopy files your father has in here, but then we need to lock it down.”

Rachel’s fingers flew over the keyboard. “The credenza in the back may have something.”

I moved there quietly. Of course, neither of us found a smoking gun that showed Seiji Tanaka or Susa Omara were the guardians of corporate trinkets. But I did scrounge up a personnel record for a Fujiwara Kobiashi. I handed it to Rachel.

“The little sneak,” I said to Rachel’s questioning look.

Rachel’s lips formed that silent o that revealed her surprise. “He was hired four months ago.” She looked up at me. “He reported to Seiji.”

“Am I surprised? Lock it down, Omen. Time to wait.”

Rachel shut down the computer and made sure the desk looked as empty as it had when we’d come in. We settled down in the seating area away from the windows and out of line of sight of the office door.

Time crawled by. When Rachel got too antsy, I suggested she nap or meditate, which helped for a while. As it got closer to nine, we heard muted voices come and go past the office door, and the faint glow of light underneath showed that the corporate machine was gearing up for another day in paradise. Finally, at a quarter to nine, I touched Rachel’s leg.

“Don’t let ‘em push you about me stickin’ with you when they read the will.”

She nodded. “Should I say anything about the antiques?”

“Why not? Just ask ‘em casually who’s in charge. Ask about your mother’s screen.”

“Okay.” She exhaled. “Here we go.”

I grinned. “I got your back, Omen.”

We tapped fists, then made our way silently to the door. I cracked it, and when the sound of steps and voices ebbed, we slipped out. Rachel went ahead of me, walking purposefully towards the conference room. She didn’t hesitate to walk in through the open door.

A few people were already present. As I expected, Rachel’s appearance set off a shock wave of excited voices and stunned expressions. I kept quiet at Rachel’s back, but I smelled Seiji Tanaka, and found him seated at the large table. He was talking rapidly into a cell phone, stopping when he saw us, though not before I heard him mention computer access – he knew someone had run files this morning. That moved him higher on my list of people to dislike, so I skewered him with a glare before checking out the others. Susa was not present. As Rachel greeted her parents’ lawyer with sober grace, the others clustered about her in varying stages of relief. I didn’t horn in, but I did check for the smell of fear and the location of hands, and if anyone’s suit jacket bulged in obvious places. All benign so far.

Seiji spoke rapidly into his phone again. “She’s here. Get Tuka on it. Now!”

When Rachel drew me forward to introduce me to the lawyer, I made sure that Seiji heard me reply in clear Japanese, saw me give the proper bow. I wanted him to know that he couldn’t put staccato pidgin Japanese past the stupid gaijin with Rachel. That ought limit what he’d say in the room.

At I expected, there were questions about my presence, but Rachel brushed them aside firmly. She spoke briefly about the attempt on her life and how she had taken steps to protect herself against repeat attacks. All I had to do was stay in the background and subvocalize a hair’s worth of menace to convince people that dismissing me wasn’t negotiable. So the reading commenced.

There was a lot of corporate mumbo jumbo that I gave only partial attention to. Most of my attention focused on everyone in the room. I kept an ear cocked for any unusual sounds coming from outside, but there were none. What I picked up from the listeners was relief that Rachel was unharmed, and nervousness about me. I got an interesting thread of fear from our pal Seiji. As Rachel had expected, the will put her parents’ stock into trust, and left bequests to various aunts and cousins and friends. Interestingly, trinkets that expressly went to Rachel were the crane screen from her mother’s office, as well as her father’s samurai helmet and katanas from the reception area. It was a perfect opening for Rachel, and once all was read and blessed, she used it.

“I thank you, Jitsuko-san,” she rose and bowed to the lawyer. “Can you tell me, please, who is in charge of my parents’ antiques here at the office? I would like to make arrangements for my mother’s screen and my father’s pieces. They would be great comforts to me. I miss my parents very much.”

Seiji nearly leaped out of his skin, which marked him as good as guilty to me. But I kept my gaze even and my snarl to myself. I wanted to see how long it took before he crumbled under his own agitation.

“I’m sure that can be arranged, Osaka-san,” the lawyer assured her. “I understand the staff has planned a luncheon for all the beneficiaries of the will. I am sure that Tanaka-san can make inquiries during that time, and have the information ready for you after we have eaten. Will that be satisfactory?”

Rachel glanced at me, and I blinked no. I wanted Seiji where I could watch him. “There’s no need for that speed. I feel sure he can make arrangements in the next day of so.”

“No, no, I will look into it immediately,” Seiji said with alacrity. “Please excuse me.”

I followed him to the door. “Mind if I tag along, bub?” I asked pleasantly. “Though I think that Osaka-san would prefer you enjoy lunch with the rest of us. Please, honor her request.”

“Yes, Tanaka-san, do,” Rachel added.

“No, no, I would much prefer to see to Osaka-san’s request. That is the most important thing, to ease her distress over her parents’ deaths –”

“Then come have lunch,” I smiled, but my subvocalized messages weren’t nearly as sweet.

The man gulped. “All right, if that is what you wish, Osaka-san.”

Rachel smiled gratefully. If I didn’t know her, I would’ve thought she was sincere, but I stifled my amusement at her dissembling when we all trooped up to the penthouse dining room for lunch.

I won’t bore you with the details of omiotsuke and shrimp tempura and enough china and crystal and ebony chopsticks to open a store. The food was delicious, but watching Seiji Tanaka wrestle with his nerves was more so. Damned amateur. Halfway through, he seemed to get a grip on himself, and actually made one or two attempts at conversation. But eventually the corporate tedium came to an end, and Rachel and I were more than ready to climb out of the lion’s den. Once we were back in the corporate reception area, Seiji was quick to take the glass case cradling the katanas off the wall and present it with a bow to Rachel.

“Please, Osaka-san, take these with you. I will see to the other items myself as quickly as may be.”

I stepped in to take the box as Rachel thanked him. “Oh, are you the one who cares for the antiques?”

“Oh, no,” Seiji assured her. “That’s Omara-san. And a beautiful job she does. Why, just yesterday she had made arrangements to set these katanas aside for you. That’s why you can take them with you. I will ask her to expedite the other items immediately. I’m sure you will have them in only a few days.”

“I thank you, Tanaka-san,” Rachel bowed. “Now, it’s been a very long day, and I’m sure you understand my desire to retire. I will contact you in a day or two about the other pieces.”

“Of course, of course. I will wait for your call.”

“Good-bye.”

“Good-bye.”

We stood quietly, not making a move for the elevator, but Seiji didn’t wait for us to leave. He bolted out of reception area like a devil was after him. Only then did I press the elevator button. A few seconds passed before the doors opened.

“Stay here,” I said as I went inside only long enough to press as many buttons as I could and still make it out again before the doors closed. “Stairs.”

Rachel nodded to the left. I left the boxed katanas on the receptionist’s desk and I pulled Rachel after me down the hallway and into the stairwell as quickly as I could.

“What’re you doing?” Rachel whispered.

“Bein’ paranoid. Maybe our pal Seiji bugged the katanas. I bet he’s callin’ friends as we speak. They ain’t people I want to meet in an elevator. Go!”

We hustled down ten flights before we heard someone below us. The voices didn’t sound encouraging.

“No friends of ours,” Rachel confirmed, her eyes glowing. We bailed out on the tenth floor.

“Any other stairs?” I asked, putting my hand to my comm unit and set it to transmit to more than just Rachel. If I’d been alone, I wouldn’t have bothered. But Rachel was not a pro for all of her skills, and I didn’t want this to turn into what was euphemistically called “a hostage situation.” The X-Men might be a continent away, but once they listened to the chatter, they’d call the local cops to help us out.

Rachel ran and I followed. We got down another flight of stairs before we heard more voices, this time from both above and below, and I didn’t have to look at Rachel’s eyes to confirm anything. We bailed again. This time, I pushed the elevator button, and Rachel and I rose back up to the twentieth floor.

“When this door opens, you head for Seiji’s office like hell’s behind you. I want him. Got it?”

“Absolutely,” Rachel breathed, panting.

We both watched the floor indicator creep up. When the door opened to deposit us back in the plush reception area, Rachel bolted out and ran down the hall. At Seiji’s office, she held me back, put her finger to her lips, and pointed to the corner. I went. I heard her knock on the door, Seiji answer, and Rachel go inside quietly. She was quite the actress, saying something about the katanas, and asking if he would come see about them. He followed her out to the elevators, and put the box under his arm to accompany her down. Just as the doors opened, I slid in behind them.

“Remember me, bub?” I hissed, taking Seiji’s arm. I poked a finger hard into his back, and if he thought it was a gun, I didn’t dissuade him.

“What floor?” Rachel asked.

“Lobby. We’re getting out of here with an escort. Get the katanas out of the box.”

Rachel took the box from Seiji and quickly removed the twin blades from the case.

“Are they the real thing?” I asked.

Seiji started to protest, but I squeezed his arm hard. “I asked the lady, bub. You keep it shut. Omen?”

Grimacing, Seiji clamped his mouth shut and wisely didn’t say a word.

“They’re my father’s katanas. The elevator’s not stopping at the lobby,” Rachel warned.

“Figures. Get behind me.”

Rachel ducked behind me. I heard her draw both of the katanas from their sheaths just as the elevator stopped at the underground parking level. The doors opened. It didn’t bother me that the garage was dark and a black stretch limousine idled beyond, but the four toughs between us and the limo did.

“You must be Tuka,” I grinned at the nearest one. “This is your pal Seiji. If you want to keep him in one piece, back off.”

I poked Seiji again, who reinforced my words with a little squeak. The toughs reluctantly backed up.

“Which way is the exit? I asked Rachel quietly in French, hoping none of the thugs understood it.

“To the right,” she replied in kind. “One flight up is the street.”

“When we come out of the elevator, put your back against mine and make sure no one gets behind us.”

When I felt Rachel’s elbow against my back, I edged out of the elevator. I had my left arm around Seiji’s neck and my right hand at his side, ready to pop a claw if it came to that. Of course, one of the toughs had to edge forward, so I popped my right claws.

“That’s the only warnin’ you get. Back off.”

The toughs gave ground. Rachel edged forward towards the exit, smart enough to stay evenly between the rows of parked cars. I let her guide me and kept my eyes on the toughs who edged after me.

“Ten meters to the steps,” Rachel warned me in French, her voice cool and even. She was hanging tough, keeping her fear under control and her wits about her. “Ten steps up, a left, and outside.”

“Copy that. Check the stairwell before you get any nearer.”

“Clear.”

“Go.”

Rachel made it up two steps before someone hurtled on top of her. As quickly as that, she was hanging in the arms of a thug just like the four behind me. She fought, but the guy was way too strong for her.

“Another story now, isn’t it, Mr. Logan?” Seiji smirked as one of the thugs gathered up the katanas.

“Not for you, bub. You go first, no matter what.”

“And the girl goes second.”

“What do you care? You won’t see it. More to the point, you won’t see me gut the rest of your pals before you hit the ground.”

“Maybe not.”

Four more thugs materialized out of the darkness. Now the odds were harder to figure. There were enough of them that Rachel would probably go down before I could get to her. She looked at me with eyes the size of saucers because she’d figured the same odds.

“You will go with us,” Seiji snapped. “Now.”

“Yeah?” I growled. “Maybe for the moment. But you’re still with me. Don’t forget it.”

I let them back me over to the limo. Two of them hustled Rachel in first, then I climbed in with my fingers clamped around Seiji’s throat. Enough of the henchmen piled in after us to make it interesting, but nobody ventured too close to me and my captive. Then again, all too many of them clustered around Rachel. I sent her a look, cautioning patience, so she held herself as still as possible. The door slammed behind us, cocooning us in darkness. The limo sped out into the daylight and away. Maybe it was the limo’s tinted glass, but the afternoon sun didn’t look too bright.

 

* * *

 

We rode for close to forty minutes into an industrial area of San Francisco near one of the less picturesque wharfs. A dingy warehouse door opened ahead and the limo disappeared into the depths. When the door closed, we were left with only the few scattered courtesy lights inside the limo to break through the pitch. A door opened. Once out of the car, I spotted a lot of crates and boxes, probably part of an import/export business. The few people working inside took one look at the crew from the limo and scattered. Maybe they’d seen such scenes before.

In the general milling around, I spotted most of the thugs pulling out knives. All at once Rachel frantically renewed her struggles against the thug holding her, shrieking about the knives. Between her talent and her fear, her eyes were as bright as I’d seen.

I took the closest thing to a shot I had. I shoved Seiji into the biggest knot of the thugs and lunged for the guy holding Rachel. She saw me coming and dropped, her dead weight throwing the man off balance enough that he fell right into my claws. I hit him hard, taking off an arm and probably most of his head. I grabbed Rachel, jerked her over my shoulder so hard that she cried out, and sprinted with her to the nearest stack of crates.

“You all right?” I panted, uprighting her.

“Scared to death!”

“Good. Hang tight, Omen!”

We didn’t get overwhelmed right away, because the thugs were smart enough not to come after me one at a time. But there were a lot of them, and they kept trying to circle around behind to get at Rachel. Without the katanas to give teeth to her attack, I had to give ground, but these guys weren’t much of a fighting force. For a fraction of a second, they left an opening that I crashed through with Rachel behind me, right towards the limo where Seiji stood with those katanas in his hands. He tried to duck into the car, but I dragged him out by his belt and tore the blades from him. As soon as I thrust them at Rachel, she wove a pattern of blows around us, forcing the thugs to give ground. I shoved Seiji back in the car to reach Rachel – a miscalculation on my part. I heard a shot, felt a streak of fire in my chest. My lungs stopped working. I couldn’t feel my legs. My heart wasn’t there to beat. Someone screamed – probably Rachel, because my body didn’t have the means.

Grey, nothing but grey… black for a handful of heartbeats, except my heart wasn’t there to beat. The black cleared into a mass of movement, blurred again, then resolved. I found myself face down on dank concrete. Someone was still screaming.

My heart lurched back into rhythm, my lungs gasped for breath, and my brain finally snapped into gear. A knot of activity surged by me. Four of the thugs had Rachel between them, but she still fought. Her heavy boot connected with someone’s jaw, but all it got her was a slap hard enough to stun her. Then somebody thrust one of those long knives deep into her chest. Her shriek went through my body like an electrical jolt.

That was the last thought I had as a man for a while.

When I was sentient again, pieces of thugs were everywhere and the stench of blood burned my throat like acid. Worse were Rachel’s eyes as she sprawled in the midst, hand pressed to her side. She gaped wide-eyed at me like I was a monster.

I had been, only moments before.

I swallowed bile, sheathed my claws, and went to her despite my shame. “Lemme see, darlin’.”

The wound was deep; the bleeding, fierce. She gasped. The knife had punctured her lung. I tore off a piece of my shredded shirt and pressed it hard against her side to stem the bleeding and to keep air from rushing in. I was too numb for words.

It’s funny. Sirens started to blare, but I didn’t consciously hear them. Instead, a soft scrape behind me whipped me around. It was Seiji, one bloody arm hanging limply at his side, struggling to bring his handgun to bear in his off hand. I popped all six claws in mid leap. He managed to pull the trigger, even managed to hit me again, but this one passed through my side rather than through my heart and spine, and while it hurt like bloody hell, it didn’t slow me down. I sliced off his hand as if it were a dry twig. Then I had his throat in my hand.

“If she dies, I will gut you over three days and hang you up with your own intestines, bub,” I snarled. “So you better hope your henchmen are as lousy assassins as you are!”

I threw him down and went back to Rachel. The sirens finally registered, then shouts from the arriving police.

“Medic!” I howled, pressing my hands against Rachel’s side again. She was still conscious, but only barely. “I need a medic over here stat!”

“Wolverine,” Rachel whispered.

“Don’t talk. The medics are comin’. I’m sorry, darlin’. I let the beast get the best of me –”

“Stop it,” she whispered. “I want you to know –”

Footsteps pounded closer. I waved the EMTs over. “Stay with me, Omen. Stay with me. What do you want me to know?”

“When Seiji shot you –” She grimaced, gasped, then choked. Blood seeped through my fingers and dotted her lips. I tore off more of my shirt and pressed it hard against her side. “— the bullet exploded out of your chest. Right where your heart was. You were dead. I just flashed – I wanted to kill them –”

“I told you – Over here! Now! – I told you. I heal. Seiji can’t stop my heart. Only you can do that right now, if you don’t hang on. Stay with me, Omen. You cannot stand down yet. Just stay with me.”

The EMTs finally got to us, and I let them go to work. A policeman showed up, took one look, and blanched. At some point in the middle of the questions, it registered that they knew who I was and what had gone down, so someone in New York had come through. In a few minutes the police left me alone, and I couldn’t avoid the carnage – which wasn’t just my own. To one side were the pieces of three men taken apart with a katana. Rachel hadn’t left as many pieces as I had, but to call the results less than savage would have been a lie.

Dunno if that made me feel better, or worse.

I spotted Seiji as he tried to crawl away, bleeding stump and all. I hauled him out from under the limo and snarled at him good and hard before I threw him at the feet of the nearest policeman. I was rewarded with whimpers.

“He set this up,” I growled to the policeman, “so make sure he gets your best attention after you patch him up. As for you,” I directed at Seiji, “you don’t deserve to die as fast as your henchmen. I hope your future cellmates drag it out a long, long time. ’Course, you remember what I said if she dies. So you better pray she lives, bub.”

Rachel was on a gurney under a mess of monitors and tubes. I trailed behind it as they hustled her out, sped up when her hand seemed to beckon to me. I got swept into the rush to load her into an ambulance, and then found myself in the front seat roaring through the streets of San Francisco towards the nearest hospital. Things got even more chaotic once we hit the ER. Given my tattered and bloodied clothes, a doctor tried to check me for wounds, but I pushed him towards the frenzy centered on Rachel.

“I’m fine,” I growled. “Look after her, bub. I’m fine!”

The doctor started to protest, but someone drew him aside to whisper in his ear, and he backed off with understanding in his eyes. I didn’t care what had finally gotten through to him. I just wanted him away.

“Mr. Logan?”

A grey-haired nurse in blood-smeared pink scrubs stood before me, her brow wrinkled in concern and her hands laden with a big plastic bag. It held Rachel’s shredded clothes. Her boots. The comm link.

I met her eyes. “Yeah?”

“I thought you’d want to know. We’re taking her to surgery now.”

“What?” I narrowed my gaze on the woman’s face. She patiently waited for me to make sense of her words. Was I in that much shock? “Yeah. Will she live?”

She shrugged noncommittally. “We’ll do everything we can. Let me show you the waiting area.”

“Where do I donate blood for her?”

The nurse’s gaze strayed to my ruined shirt. “You’re a mutant, Mr. Logan –”

“So’s she. You got enough mutant blood on hand without mine?”

Her lips tightened in concession. “I’ll show you the way. Afterwards, you can wait in the lounge straight down that hall.”

The nurse pointed, then went to find someone to take me to the donation center. As I waited, Rachel’s gurney was hustled away. Her face was as white as the sheets around her. Above the oxygen mask, her eyes were closed. My insides clenched.

 

* * *

 

About five hours into surgery, the space before my feet darkened, and a pair of embroidered sandals registered. I looked up to meet ‘Ro’s dark eyes. She slipped into the chair beside me and took my hand in hers.

“You all right?”

“Stellar.”

‘Ro checked out the ragged, discolored mess of my clothes. I probably looked pale, too, given how much blood I’d donated, but she didn’t comment.

“Any word about Rachel?”

I shook my head.

‘Ro sighed in sympathy. “She really got under your skin, didn’t she?”

I kept staring at the floor. “Don’t tell me you’ve gone psychic, too.”

‘Ro smiled ruefully. “I didn’t have to. The students have had a pool going for a month about when you and Rachel would finally link up.”

I snorted. “You need to give those kids a lot more homework.”

‘Ro’s arm went around my shoulders. “At least you’re still growling.”

I didn’t say anything. ‘Ro knew what was behind the growl as well as the silence. I shut my eyes and tried not to think about Rachel’s white, white face.

 

* * *

 

The minutes crawled, but they did pass. I took that as a good sign – the more time that passed, the better Rachel’s chances were to pull through. Still, when a guy in scrubs padded into the waiting area, my gut clenched.

“Mr. Logan?”

I climbed to my feet. “How’s Rachel – Miss Osaka?”

“She’s in recovery. Considering her wounds, she came through well. She lost almost half her blood during the attack and more during the operation, but we transfused four pints, including the three you donated. Her lung was punctured and three ribs were broken. She’s not out of danger yet, but the odds look much better than they did.”

I exhaled a long breath. “When can I see her?”

“Are you next of kin?”

I shook my head.

“Then it’ll be a while.”

‘Ro stepped forward. “Doctor Marshall, I believe Mr. Logan’s cleared for access as next of kin. Charles Xavier discussed it with the hospital administrator earlier. I’m his representative, Ororo Monroe.”

Marshall looked surprised, but nodded his understanding. “I’ll have someone check on that for you, Ms. Monroe. Excuse me.”

The doctor stopped by the nurses’ station down the hall, and a nurse picked up a phone. I went to the window, stared out, but noted only in the back of my mind that it was getting dark. A lot of ships came and went in the bay. In the middle of the water, Alcatraz Island gleamed. When footsteps headed my way, I turned to see Marshall.

“Mr. Logan, I’ll take you to Miss Osaka. Keep it very brief, please. The best thing for her is rest.”

“You got it, doc.” _And thanks, Chuck. I owe you._

_I’m glad to help, Logan. My best wishes for Rachel._

Charles faded from my thoughts, and I nodded my thanks to ‘Ro before I hurried after the doctor. We wound in and out of the organized chaos of the ER to an area only slightly less chaotic. I glimpsed only a snarl of wires and tubes before Marshall put his hand on my arm.

“She’s heavily sedated, but she is conscious. Only a couple of minutes, okay?”

“Absolutely.”

I eased to Rachel’s side. She wasn’t so pale as before, even though one side of her face was bruised, and an oxygen tube was taped under her nose. Her eyes were closed. IVs fed into the back of each hand. Leads to a heart monitor snaked under her hospital gown to attach to her chest. Another monitored blood pressure. Another tube took care of urine. There was probably a chest drain, too, depending on how bad the puncture was. As a nurse moved away, I snagged a chair, sat by the gurney, and gingerly cradled her right hand in mine, careful not to disturb the IV line. Her fingers were cold, but they tightened on mine.

“Hey, kid.”

Her eyelids fluttered but didn’t quite open. “Wolverine?”

“I’m here, Omen. You done good. You’re through surgery and you’re in recovery.”

“Stand… down?”

“You can stand down, darlin’. Doc says the best thing is for you to sleep. Let your body heal.”

Her lips curved in a lopsided smile, and her eyes opened hazily. “Logan. Glad… to see you.”

“Glad to see you, Rachel. You hung tough.”

“You saved my life.”

I swallowed. “I didn’t do a real good job of it, kid. I’m sorry.”

Her forehead wrinkled in a vague frown. “Logan...”

“I’m here.”

She grimaced. “Don’t….” Her eyelids fluttered again.

“Don’t what, darlin’?”

“Don’t beat… yourself up… for what happened. There were a lot of them… even… for a samurai.”

I winced at the memory. “Rachel…”

She took a painful breath. “I killed those men… because I thought they’d killed you. I won’t… apologize for it.”

“I want you to take care of yourself for a while. Rest. Heal. Hear me?”

She almost focused on me as she took another labored breath. “I felt it. That knife… going into my heart next. You didn’t… let that happen. Just like I gave you… time to heal from… the gunshot. Don’t you… bail… because of that.”

“I’m here, Rachel. Right now, you have to sleep. That’ll help you heal.”

“Said that… million times.” Her eyes closed as she eased in another breath. She smiled before she let herself drift away.

I checked the monitors. Her pulse was even, her blood pressure was steady, and her respiration was smooth. I listened to her breath gradually lengthen as she slipped into sleep.

Into my thoughts swam a fuzzy snippet of memory, my body floundering on dank concrete, my heart fighting to restart as Rachel savagely winged her father’s katana through a man like he was so much straw, her eyes blazing bright demon gold, her spirit raging no less than mine moments later.

The emotions that flooded me were too tangled to sort through – shame, shock, fury, savage admiration, recognition, regret… too many more.

I put Rachel’s hand back by her side and retraced my steps back to the waiting room and ‘Ro. She looked up as I paced towards her, but didn’t speak.

I exhaled. “She looks like spaghetti. Nothin’ but tubes. But she’ll make it.”

“Good,” ‘Ro’s warm smile mirrored the relief in her voice. “I’m so glad.”

I nodded and sat next to her. This wasn’t the most comfortable chair I’d ever slept in, but now that I could stand down, I’d make do –

‘Ro cocked her head. “Logan, they’re trying to chase us out of here. Visiting hours are long since over, and I’ll bet you haven’t eaten since lunch. So what’s say we go grab a couple of burgers?”

I shook my head. “I’ll stay for a while. Then I’ll get the hog, pick up our gear.”

“Where’s the hog, Logan?”

I shrugged. “Stashed near the corporate office building.”

“That’s ten miles from here.”

“I’ll enjoy the walk.”

“You know you need to eat, Logan. You have to fuel the machine.”

“’Ro –”

“Bullshit, Logan,” she snapped. She might look like the elegant African princess she used to be, but occasionally she saw fit to remind me of her time on the streets. “Rachel’s as okay as she can be right now, and there are people to watch her, so you need to stand down and take care of yourself. Now, we are going to get something to eat, and then we’ll find the hog. After that, you can ride all night if you want.”

I glanced at her. “You feel better after sayin’ all of that?”

She stood up, put her arms akimbo, and looked down at me with a surly expression. “That depends on your response.”

I exhaled, got up, shrugged. “Okay, ‘Ro. Let’s go get your burger.”

She looked surprised at my acquiescence. Perversely, I grinned. “What?”

“You never give in that easily.”

I took her arm and patted it as we walked out of the hospital. “Like I said, I live for these moments.”

 

* * *

 

I let ‘Ro harass me into eating, and after a few hours and a few beers she dropped me off by the Harley. Then she snapped the leash and took herself off to a hotel. I rode around for a while, eventually stopping at the bus terminal where Rachel and I had stowed our duffels. It was close to three in the morning when I took everything back to the cabin where we’d spent the last two days. I slept off and on, but I missed Rachel’s body beside me, her scent, the whisper of her breathing, and the loss woke me like a dog trying to make peace with a new bed. Around nine, I cleaned up and called the hospital to check on visiting hours, then spent the next twelve hours either in the waiting room of the hospital or beside Rachel’s bed. That turned into the pattern for the next several days. By then, ‘Ro decided I was okay alone, so she flew Chuck’s Blackbird home. Rachel was a lot more awake and grew steadily stronger. I still missed her at night, but at least she was out of immediate danger.

The police stopped by once Rachel was strong enough to talk, and we gave our depositions. Seiji Tanaka ended up being the ineptitude behind the antiques business. He thought replacing the Osaka antiques with fakes was an easy way to make money, not realizing that Rachel’s parents actually knew the provenance of their pieces better than he did. Because Rachel had avoided her talents for so long, he didn’t realize that she could instantly identify the theft until too late, so he set out to take her out of the equation. He’d bungled that, too, because the last thing Rachel’s parents did for their daughter was to shield her from the assassins’ bullets, and I’d stopped the pro who’d come after her in Westchester. Susa Omara was just a dupe, so the whole thing settled a lot sooner than I’d figured. That suited me, because I had a lot more time to savor Rachel’s recovery.

After a few days, Chuck offered to fly Rachel home in the Blackbird, which would minimize the time she’d be in the air and away from medical treatment. But she was content to stay in the city by the bay.

“Professor X was kind to offer me the jet,” she whispered as we sat in the patient observation area to take in the view of the bay one morning. “But that isn’t the way I want to go home, once I’m ready to travel.”

“Oh?” I questioned, arching an eyebrow.

“No.”

I waited her out. She gave a breathy chuckle and put a hand on my wrist. I looked at it, then at her.

“I’m thinking road trip,” she said.

My pulse jumped without conscious thought, which brought a smile to Rachel’s lips.

Six weeks later, we took that road trip.

 

# # #


End file.
